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**enlinnyGoob** · 06-04-2010, 10:51 PM

This article is 9 years old but still relevant:

U.S. Guns Smuggled Into Mexico Aid Drug War

U.S. Guns Smuggled Into Mexico Aid Drug War

At the crime lab, run by the firearms bureau, an agent had sifted through thousands of pending gun trace requests filed by Mexico. She saw that the guns were part of a pattern: 5 identical rifles, with consecutive serial numbers, had turned up after a 1996 shootout where Arellano Félix enforcers killed two Mexican soldiers; 15 more had been seized after another battle with the gang.

The agent called the two federally licensed firearms dealers in the United States to whom the guns could be traced on paper. The first was Loretta Welch, who ran a weapons shop just outside San Diego called the Shooter's Emporium. The second was a man who ran a small mom-and-pop gun shop in Nevada. Ms. Welch faxed paperwork to the firearms agent showing that she had sold the 80 assault weapons to the Nevada dealer. He adamantly denied it.

"I now have one gun dealer who's lying to me," the firearms agent said in an interview. "I thought it was a huge problem."

Search warrants and interviews revealed that Ms. Welch's paperwork was phony. She had sold 80 of the Chinese assault rifles, along with 14 used handguns, to a Tijuana weapons dealer she met at a California gun show in 1995.

So far, 21 deaths have resulted from that $27,000 transaction. Ms. Welch faces a maximum prison term of four years at her May 29 sentencing.

06-04-2010, 10:51 PM	#18
enlinnyGoob Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 406 Senior Member	This article is 9 years old but still relevant: U.S. Guns Smuggled Into Mexico Aid Drug War U.S. Guns Smuggled Into Mexico Aid Drug War At the crime lab, run by the firearms bureau, an agent had sifted through thousands of pending gun trace requests filed by Mexico. She saw that the guns were part of a pattern: 5 identical rifles, with consecutive serial numbers, had turned up after a 1996 shootout where Arellano Félix enforcers killed two Mexican soldiers; 15 more had been seized after another battle with the gang. The agent called the two federally licensed firearms dealers in the United States to whom the guns could be traced on paper. The first was Loretta Welch, who ran a weapons shop just outside San Diego called the Shooter's Emporium. The second was a man who ran a small mom-and-pop gun shop in Nevada. Ms. Welch faxed paperwork to the firearms agent showing that she had sold the 80 assault weapons to the Nevada dealer. He adamantly denied it. "I now have one gun dealer who's lying to me," the firearms agent said in an interview. "I thought it was a huge problem." Search warrants and interviews revealed that Ms. Welch's paperwork was phony. She had sold 80 of the Chinese assault rifles, along with 14 used handguns, to a Tijuana weapons dealer she met at a California gun show in 1995. So far, 21 deaths have resulted from that $27,000 transaction. Ms. Welch faces a maximum prison term of four years at her May 29 sentencing.
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