“American taxpayers must be proud,” he said.

Fink’s second question was why Gomez, a 23-year-old Phoenix-area resident who was arrested with a high-powered assault rifle, was given a plea bargain involving one low-level offense.

“How do you get to first degree misdemeanor?” the judge asked. “These (guns) are not used to throw birds out of chimneys.”

According to Deputy County Attorney Matthew Cannon, the answer to the second question was that the only charge the state could prove was a misdemeanor.

The county attorney’s office offered Gomez a felony plea bargain for possessing an AK-47 with no serial number. But that indictment required not only that Gomez possessed the weapon, but that he knew the serial number had been scraped off, according to Cannon.

However, Gomez said he had no idea because he never checked the serial number when he purchased the gun.

“We got into a situation where we couldn’t prove the charges,” Cannon said.

There also appeared to be no hard evidence that Gomez intended to bring the gun into Mexico, which may explain why federal prosecutors did not take up the case. He admitted in a written pre-sentence statement and in court Monday that he bought the gun with the intention of reselling it.

Initially expressing a penchant for rejecting the plea bargain, Fink eventually accepted and sentenced Gomez to three years of probation on misdemeanor charges.

He also served 90 days in county jail, was ordered to do 60 hours of community service, and complete a cognitive thinking class.

And as part of a plea bargain, he demanded that Gomez relinquish ownership of the AK-47.

The Mexican government claims more than 500,000 guns are smuggled into Mexico from the United States each year. In August 2021, he sued a group of U.S. gun manufacturers for $10 billion, alleging they were facilitating illegal activities that put powerful weapons into the hands of violent criminal gangs.

U.S. officials in Arizona appear to be doing better these days in combating the southward flow of guns, but the numbers seized are down from the number of weapons Mexico says are safely crossing the border. In fiscal 2021, exit rifle seizures at U.S. Customs and Border Protection ports of entry in southern Arizona increased to 104, up from just eight the year before. In 2021, more than 101 handguns were seized at ports, up from 16 the previous year.

But these busts were made at the port of entry, leaving little doubt that they are transnational crimes.

Occasionally, busts made off-port are subject to federal smuggling charges. Like the incident earlier this year in Tempe, where two men were arrested at a local self-storage facility after purchasing thousands of rounds of large-caliber ammunition. The two reportedly admitted that the ammunition was destined for Mexico, and both were indicted in federal district court in Tucson.

In Gomez’s case, the arrest took place several miles from the border. And while he allegedly admitted he was heading to Mexico, he never directly admitted there he was going to take the gun with him.

According to pre-sentencing reports, Gomez was pulled over by Arizona State Police while traveling south on Interstate 19 on December 9, 2021, for what was described only as a “moving violation.” I was. When police asked him where he was going, Gomez reportedly told him he was traveling to Mexico to visit his wife, who lives there. He said he visited her every two weeks.

When security asked if there was anything illegal in the car, Gomez reportedly said no and told officers he welcomed an investigation.

After Gomez signed a form consenting to the search, the troopers found four AK-47s hidden under the back seats. One had the serial number peeled off.

Officers “immediately lowered Mike to the ground and handcuffed him,” the report said.

Gomez was initially charged in the local court system with four counts of not admitting to possessing a lethal weapon and one count of possessing a defaced lethal weapon. After agreeing to plead guilty to one count of misdemeanor, he submitted a handwritten statement to the probation officer as part of his pre-sentence interview.

“I was trying to sell guns,” he wrote. “There’s no reason I was doing it. I just saw an opportunity to make extra money.”

Still, he did not specify that he was trying to sell the guns in Mexico, or to someone he knew was trying to bring the guns into Mexico.

“He had those weapons legally in his possession,” Cannon told a judge at his sentencing hearing on Monday. I don’t understand why it had to be under the back seat and headed south on I-19 at Exit 8. But until his pre-sentencing interview, “Again, what he meant was no one had proof that he had brought them to Mexico and sold them. ”

“Now he’s made some very concerning statements in his pre-sentence interview,” Cannon added. That’s all we can prove. That’s why we gave him the offer we made.”

Cannon added that the plea bargain would not prevent the county attorney’s office from filing additional gun smuggling charges. urged to regard the statements of

“Even if he hasn’t been charged with some of these things, it sends a strong message that we’re going to give him 60 days in jail so he can really think, even worse. I think it’s in his interest, what he was really trying to do,” Cannon said.

A judge ultimately sentenced Gomez to 90 days in prison.

“trying to make money”

“I know it looks really, really damaging that he’s hauling weapons south on Interstate 19,” said defense attorney James Miller. said at a hearing on Monday, adding that Gomez did not admit to him that he was bringing guns into Mexico, or even selling them.

Miller also criticized Gomez’s responsible behavior after his arrest, his paid employment as a painter, and the fact that another judge gave him freedom to travel to and from Mexico while he waited for the case to be resolved. also mentioned.

“If he’s a criminal transporting AK-47s in Mexico, he’s the most…” Miller choked. “He would never run into someone like that or behave like that at all.”

“I think it’s very likely that he was selling the guns to make money and not shipping the guns to Mexico,” Miller added. “And he made the mistake of not telling the officer that the gun was in the car. Perhaps he put the gun under the seat because he was pulled over and the type of gun. Maybe it’s because I was afraid I’d run into problems with – I don’t know.

Still, he said the issue at hand had nothing to do with the question of where the gun was going. Gomez was in court to be found guilty of making a false statement to a state trooper. “As far as serial numbers and guns go, as far as his plea goes, things like that don’t really matter,” Miller said.

When it was Gomez’s turn to speak, he told the judge:

“Like Mr. Miller said, I wasn’t trying to get them to Mexico, I was just trying to make money. I was trying to catch the man who sold me the money, but he disappeared.

But Fink didn’t seem convinced that Gomez wasn’t heading south of the border with a gun.

“I’m not so worried about the serial number … anyway, the serial number is of no use in Mexico,” he said.

“But these are four very powerful weapons that are not used for hunting or recreation. They are used to killing people. I’m trying to sell it in Mexico, where it’s illegal to own a gun.”

“The only reason we didn’t dismiss the first petition is because we don’t understand why the federal government doesn’t care about people who bring guns into Mexico in violation of US law,” the judge continued. , that’s not your problem.”

Fink asked Gomez directly if he was selling guns to Mexico.

“There’s a website called Armslist where people text people and say, ‘I want this type of gun, this and that,'” Gomez said. “And they asked me for AKs, so I bought them. That’s what actually happened.”