Y'all must not have the number of lawyers we have down here in paradise (south florida...). In my 22 years in that world I worked for five different chiefs (a below average number since the average tenure of most chiefs nationwide was around 18 months in my era.. don't have the faintest idea of what it is today...). Every one of them would have looked at me like I had two heads if I even suggested that we sell confiscated weapons. The best we were ever allowed to do was convert the better ones to "City use" and log them in as department property before issuing them out to a member of the force that had a need... All of that ended when we finally got a very modern chief who got us really quality hardware and specified that we had to use it (Sig Sauer 229's in 40 cal, H & K Mp 5's for our SRT, etc.)...
For those not from south Florida... to give you an idea of our local politics... my representative (I live just north of where I used to work in Broward county...) is Debby Wasserman Schultz... lucky me...