UPDATE: A reader noted that this story was first reported on March 24 by The Aegis newspaper, a sister publication of the Baltimore Sun. That story can be found here, and the paper identified the officer as Deputy First Class Ken Hildt.
The Harford County Sheriff's Office put out a press release this afternoon that they needed the public's help finding a stolen handgun. The release said it was taken from the Mountain Road Royal Farms Store in Joppa, and described the two suspects. It also included surveillance camera stills of the suspects and offers a cash reward.
What the release didn't include, The Sun's Jessica Anderson learned, was that the gun belonged to a county sheriff's deputy.
Of course, that was our first question: why was a handgun in a Royal Farms store in the first place? Police acknowledged that the gun belonged to a deputy who made a pit stop and left his gun in the bathroom. Oh, and the incident occurred March 1.
Earlier this month, an off-duty DC cop had his gun stolen after picking up a woman in East Baltimore. He initially said he had been carjacked.
Jessica will have a story up about the missing gun in Harford soon, and we'll link to it here.