South Carolina Ping
Posted on 11/21/2005 1:36:56 PM PST by aomagrat
Four former UPS workers, including a USC student majoring in criminal justice, have pleaded guilty to conspiracy to sell stolen handguns in what federal officials are calling one of the largest gun-trafficking schemes in the state’s history.
The scam involved more than 200 handguns stolen from the UPS sorting facility in West Columbia near the Columbia Metropolitan Airport.
William Shane Ninan, 26, of Easley; Gary Matthew Martin, 25, of Gaffney; and Julius Rozell Barnes, 27, and Sterling Serrone Leeper, 26, both of Columbia, pleaded guilty.
The scheme ran from 1999 to 2000, but the men weren’t indicted until August. The case had gone cold until some of the stolen weapons started showing up in Easley.
“We ran out of leads,” said Pat Dumais, special agent in charge of the Columbia office of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. “Part of it was that the thefts had stopped.”
Dumais called this one of the largest gun trafficking cases in the state’s history. He said there have been cases of shipping employees stealing guns, “but never this size.”
Most of the weapons came from Ellett Brothers, a major firearms wholesaler based in Chapin that uses UPS as its primary carrier.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Todd Hagins said most gun trafficking cases involve about 10 or 20 guns, usually bought from stores and sold in other states.
“These guys had a direct supply of guns they knew were coming from a particular company,” Hagins said.
Hagins said the men sold guns to their friends in South Carolina, mostly in the Upstate, who would resell them in other states. The stolen weapons have shown up in California, Washington and Michigan, he said.
The thefts started when, prosecutors say, Ninan, a car wash supervisor at UPS, stole a UPS package. At home, Ninan found a gun in the box, which had been sent by Ellett Brothers. After that, prosecutors say, Ninan started looking for packages from Ellett Brothers and gun manufacturers, including Glock.
Ninan, who Hagins said was enrolled at USC studying criminal justice at the time, recruited his roommate, Barnes, a packaging supervisor. Ninan would drive UPS trucks to the perimeter and toss packages over the fence to Barnes, who would put them in his car.
Ninan also recruited Martin, who worked at the UPS air hub. Because Ellett Brothers used UPS a lot, UPS would leave a truck at the Ellett Brothers facility so Ellett employees could load it. From there, a UPS employee would drive the truck to the air hub, and the boxes would be unloaded, scanned and loaded onto a plane.
Martin’s role, according to prosecutors, was to steal the boxes before they were scanned into the UPS system. But on Aug. 3, 2000, Martin made a mistake. He scanned one of the packages he was supposed to steal, and then manually removed it from the UPS system.
“That sent up all kinds of red flags at UPS,” Hagins said. “That’s what got us zeroing in on (Martin) as well.”
Leeper, according to court documents, helped Ninan and Barnes break into the UPS facility in February 2000 to steal more guns.
“He’s not a major participant in this,” said Charlie Jay Johnson, Leeper’s lawyer. “He’s kind of on the outskirts.”
Elias Frost also has been indicted, but his case is pending.
My husband buys from CMP also. Maybe it depends on the state you are in because Fed Ex will not ship firearms here.
I'm not sure. It may be, but it also may be that they just don't want the bad press and constant heat from the gun grabbers and they choose to appease.
***Who's more trustworthy, UPS or TSA?***
Oh for the good old days of the 1968 Gun Control Act which required all shippers to label gun shipments with a sticker in big letters, "FIREARMS". It made them easier to steal. Just ask former Railway Express employees.
I live in Pennsylvania. I also have shipped rifles to be worked on to a gunsmith and back via FedEx.
Maybe I'm wrong and Fed Ex is the only shipper. Hubby isn't here, but I know he commented a good while ago that one of them doesn't ship firearms anymore. I thought he said it was Fed Ex.
>>But on Aug. 3, 2000, Martin made a mistake. He scanned one of the packages he was supposed to steal, and then manually removed it from the UPS system.<<
I love how they tell how they caught the crooks! IDIOTS!!
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