A police operation in the state of New York in early May resulted in the seizure of 89 firearms that law enforcement says were headed to the Canadian border, to be smuggled in, including 17 stolen guns. And once more, law-abiding Canadian shooters are proven right when they say they’re not the problem.
The wrong target
Canada is in the middle of an incredibly poorly-thought-out, poorly-run firearms crackdown that started off by targeting semi-auto rifles, particularly those with tactical features, and ended up including super-rare, super-valuable hunting guns that would never be used in a drive-by. Think of the stuff you’d take elephant hunting. In the middle of this firearms confiscation program (officially called a buyback by the government), law-abiding Canadian firearms owners who’ve jumped through all the hoops the government put in their way and gotten the correct licensing have been saying they’re not the problem; they’ve been carefully vetted. It’s criminals who are the problem, and no matter how many guns the government seizes, criminals will smuggle more across the border.
This latest incident once again proves Canuck gun owners are correct. On May 7, on State Route 90 in New York, a state trooper pulled over a car containing three men and a lot of guns. The men were identified as Malik Bromfield and Kamal Salman, who are Canadian citizens and Faizan Ali, a Pakistani citizen. In the car, they had 89 firearms, say police, including 17 firearms that police say had been reported as stolen.
Police say these men were headed to the Canadian border to smuggle these firearms over. None of this has been proven in court. However, prosecutors are gearing up to throw the book at them, charging all men with one count of smuggling guns out of the U.S. (maximum sentence, 10 years) as well as a charge of unlicensed dealing in firearms (maximum sentence, 5 years), a charge of transporting stolen firearms in interstate commerce (maximum sentence, 10 years) and a charge of unlawful possession of firearms (maximum sentence, 10 years).
If convicted, they could be facing some very heavy time. Of course, the charges could all be dropped, pled away, or some other circumstance could arise to minimize the impact on these men.
See News 12’s report on the case below:
In the aftermath of the arrest, U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said “It is critically important to New Yorkers and Americans to keep illegal weapons out of the hands of criminal actors. The trafficking of dangerous weapons will be relentlessly pursued by this Office.” Too bad the Canadian government won’t take the same tack and is instead focused on licensed shooters.
