First off, talk about a "photo op"......
Then things get really murky in the reporting....
"Most of the weapons recovered were “mom and pop guns,” police said – hunting rifles, shotguns – but they got few dozen assault weapons as well...."
Then Villarigosa "..."As you can see to my right and left, these weren't just guns that weren't functioning any more," Villaraigosa said at a news conference Thursday morning. "These were serious gun -- semi-automatic weapons, guns that have no place on the streets of Los Angeles or any other city."
Then Chief Beck "... ""Those are weapons of war, weapons of death," Beck said, motioning to a selection of military-style weapons on a display table. "These are not hunting guns. These are not target guns. These are made to put high-velocity, extremely deadly, long-range rounds downrange as quickly as possible, and they have no place in our great city."
Then to top it off, possibly destroying evidence. "...Beck acknowledged that the weapons would not be checked for connections to crimes before being melted down. He said the sheer number would make that difficult, and he does not want to deter people from turning in firearms."