 |
| Gun vault: Federal agent Thomas Mangan in Phoenix shows some of the illicit weapons the ATF has seized in border regions. Robert Harbison/Special to the Christian Science Monitor |
US steadies its aim at gun trafficking into Mexico
Extra manpower is slated to be deployed to the border to pursue smuggling cases, but the huge scale of the problem dwarfs the government's response.
from the July 20, 2007 edition
Page 2 of 3
"All our field divisions under Gunrunner have shown an increase in trafficking cases to Mexico," says Dewey Webb, special agent in charge of the Houston division. "Obviously we have to do our everyday stuff ..., but most of our groups are focusing on interdicting weapons going to Mexico."
Just last week, Mr. Webb's office and its Mexican counterpart confiscated five AK-47s from a suspect who they say had crossed into Mexico. The Houston area, Webb says, is one of the largest origination points for weapons flowing to the south.
But in a sign that border enforcement there is squeezing the illegal gun trade, traffickers are shifting their routes to Arizona and California.
That means the ATF in Phoenix is also zeroing in on gun stores and gun shows close to the border, to crack down on suspicious transactions like the one on July 7 at the Crossroads of the West Gun Show, says Newell, the division head.
In part, the ATF's presence at gun shows is educational. The bureau often sets up booths at shows to inform buyers and sellers how illicit purchases are made – and to remind the public that buying a gun for someone else is a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
"The gun shows are a crossroads where you have legitimate people exercising their legal rights, but also where there's a criminal element purchasing guns for prohibited confederates," says Thomas Mangan, senior special agent with the ATF in Phoenix. Gun shows are "where firearms trafficking and the drug trade intersect."
More Mexican nationals and known gang members from southern California are frequenting Arizona gun shows, officials report. At the shows, they especially seek out unlicensed merchants holding "private sales," because they know those sellers do not have to fill out ATF Form 4473, which provides trace data that US law requires licensed gun dealers to supply upon a gun sale.
Drug cartels, say officials, have weapons procurers – networks that arrange for straw purchases like the one the ATF intercepted earlier this month in Phoenix. In that case, the young woman "flipped" and is now working with officials to identify others in the network. She was one of the "girls" tapped by the young man – whom authorities say they suspect of being a middleman for a cartel – to buy weapons at the gun show. A single mother of three young children, she was paid $100 for each of the three weapons she bought, officials say.
"These middlemen will often call several people they know, have them each buy three or four guns until they have 30 or 40," says the ATF's Mr. Mangan. "Then they will send them south across the border."
RSS feed
