Former Mayor Grove files missing guns report 10 days after Burns gun reported missing

Ten days after denying he took a gun that was reported missing from the town of Burns, former police chief and Mayor Edgar “Shot” Grove filed a report with the Dickson County Sheriff’s Office saying he is missing two handguns. Deputy Jerry Booker took a report Feb. 14 in which Grove says he allowed his son Jason to borrow four pistols in 2011 for a handgun safety class he and his wife were going to take. “Mr. Shot Grove stated that some time had passed and he had asked several times for the pistols to be returned and Mr. Jason Grove was now stating that he didn’t have the guns,” the incident report states. Grove, now a Burns commissioner, said he did get two of the pistols back from new police Chief Paul McCallister last month. Grove told Booker he is still missing two .22-caliber pistols but does not know the makes, models or serial numbers. At the Feb. 4 Board of Commissioners meeting, McCallister reported he could not locate a 9-millimeter Ruger listed on the town’s inventory as last being issued to Grove. McCallister said Grove told him he presented the gun to himself when he stepped down as chief in 2005 after being de-certified by the Peace Officers Standards and Training Commission. But McCallister said he could find no record of the commission approving giving the gun to Grove and asked Mayor Landon Mathis to sign a report of a missing or stolen gun that could be entered into the National Crime Information Center database. At that time Mathis said he would take care of the issue. The mayor said Tuesday night that he did sign the report and it was filed for entry in the computer system. Grove denied taking the gun or making the statement to McCallister, who said he has a recording of it. According to Booker’s report, when the deputy asked Grove if he wanted to pursue charges for theft, Grove “stated that he just wanted the liability off of him if something bad should happen with those guns.” In asking Mathis to sign the missing gun report, McCallister said he wanted to protect the town from liability if the gun is ever used in a crime.