State: Illegal guns, drugs end up in furnace

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Illegal guns, drugs end up in furnace

By TIMES WIRES
Published July 4, 2007

JACKSONVILLE - The fate of illegal guns and drugs that end up in the evidence rooms of police agencies all around the state is usually a 100-ton furnace in North Florida.

In the end, most of the guns and drugs stored in police evidence rooms in Volusia and Flagler counties goes up in smoke as investigators watch, making sure they're destroyed.

Gerdau Ameristeel's Jacksonville steel mill has been obliterating guns and drugs for police departments for so long that general manager Donnie Shumake says he doesn't remember when the program - a free service to law enforcement - started.

[Last modified July 4, 2007, 00:55:38]

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