Police fear crims are using 3D printers to manufacture weapons

Sweeping raids across Melbourne has given police fresh evidence that crims are getting their hands on weapons by using this futuristic technology.

Operation Athena, which was led by Australian Border Force, made 86 arrests and took away 523 guns nationwide.

Eight homemade guns – four of them military grade – have been seized in Melbourne as part of a nationwide anti-firearms blitz.

Guns, silencers and ammunition were uncovered in a sweep of raids amid fresh evidence of use of 3D printers to manufacture weapons.

A drug lab was uncovered at one property and almost $200,000 in cash confiscated at another as part of Operation Athena.

Athena, which was led by Australian Border Force, made 86 arrests and took away 523 guns nationwide, including the seizure of more than 80 by Victoria Police officers, who laid 168 charges

A Montmorency man, 34, was charged with firearms crimes after eight homemade guns, among them military-grade weapons, were found at a home in that suburb.

Weapons at a Brunswick property.

More weapons.

Two 3D printers, firearms parts, ammo and swords were found by Mill Park divisional response unit investigators.

They then located another 48 guns at a property in Macleod.

Officers from the illicit firearms unit and VIPER taskforce seized a loaded handgun, 3D gun parts, $192,360 in cash, ammo, 200 ecstasy tablets and prescription medication after serving an firearm prohibition order on a 29-year-old Roxburgh Park man.

He was charged with possessing an unregistered handgun, trafficking drugs of dependence, possessing property suspected of being the proceeds of crime, possessing cartridge ammunition, committing an indictable offence while on bail and firearm and drug offences.

Warrnambool officers charged a 21-year-old man after seizing ammunition, a silencer and a homemade gun at a Bostocks Creek home.

That man was already the subject of a firearms prohibition order banning him from having a gun.

Police make an arrest.

A 33-year-old Brunswick man was charged and a clandestine drug laboratory and meth seized as part of Athena.

At Point Cook, a 38-year-old man was arrested for possession of an imitation firearm after an FPO check.

A 34-year-old and a 28-year-old woman, both from Caulfield North, are expected to be charged on summons after an FPO check on the man netted cannabis, methamphetamine, 1,4-Butanediol and chemical and scientific glassware.

ABF Assistant Commissioner Erin Dale said the organisation made 98 seizures of illicit firearms, firearm parts and firearm accessories at the border in the period before Athena.

“ABF and its federal and state and territory law enforcement partners will continue to target people who attempt to import firearms, parts or accessories such as silencers into Australia without a proper permit,” Commissioner Dale said.

Some of the firearms seized.

Detective Superintendent Jason Kelly from the Victoria Police anti-gangs division said illicit firearms remained a key priority for law enforcement across Australia.

“Firearms-related violence is one of the most significant issues we face, and we understand there is immense community concern when it comes to these weapons,” Superintendent Kelly said. “Partnerships with federal and state law enforcement agencies are key because firearms-related crime is not only a problem here in our own jurisdiction, it’s an issue nationally.”

The Australian Federal Police was also involved in Athena, which made some significant finds interstate. They included an M60 belt-fed machinegun in Queensland and a computer in NSW containing 3D printing blueprints for a Glock 17 pistol.