http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101104/ap_on_re_us/us_weapons_smuggling_navy_seal
Damn $1300 for a full auto Kalashnikov. . . 
If was on his jury Id vote not guilty.
Full auto’s should be legal to own without the NFA, and until recently war bring backs were common among soldiers. In fact there have been amnesty periods in the past for undocumented war bring back NFA weapons. War bring backs have been a theme of military services for over a thousand years.
Of course considering the laws and rules today what he did was dumb but that doesn’t make those laws and rules right.
Very true
This story isn’t about a war trophy prosecution, what are you guys talking about?
Machine guns shouldn’t be illegal in the first place?
If I was on a jury I would not vote to prosecute anyone of any firearms law except theft of a firearm or something like that.
I don’t care if a soldier wants to bring back 50 MG’s, and sell them. They shouldn’t be illegal in the first place, and our soldiers should be able to bring back as many “bring backs” as they can fit in their bags. IF they want to sell them its their property.
Remember only until recently has our own military had strict rules against bring backs. The ATF has had to have amnesty periods in the past because of the shear number of illegal NFA weapons out there that were bring backs. The ATF has also admitted there is more unregistered NFA weapons out there than registered ones.
So if some SEAL wants to risk his neck overseas, take some weapons back, and sell them then fine by me. If you’re going to bring up the grenades remember that when our country was founded people legally owned cannons and other artillery weapons that were capable of more damage than a grenade. Even mortars were around at that time, and legal to own. Those were far more destructive than a hand grenade of today.
The one gotcha in all this is they were supposedly trying to sell them into Mexico according to the article. But I agree with Belmont31R in principle on this.
Jury Nullification.
There is something bogus in the story. For $1300 the Mex drug lords can order a shipping container full of AKs from Mozambique.
Did you guys miss the parts of this story where it says he was in-possession of hand grenades & C4? Also, I dont consider 80 AK’s to be battle field pick-up souvenirs, especially if he was selling them.
Im no fan of the ATF either, but c’mon man!
Agreed. Stolen gov’t property? The suspects in this case knew exactly what they were doing.
And think about WHO they were trying to sell to & why? (i.e. arming criminals for money).
I appreciate the service of the Seals & know most of them are “by the book;” many are unsung heroes.
But every year or so there is a story which pops up about a special operations person caught with either stolen US weapons or smuggled ordnance. Seems to be a pattern of abuses to me (anyone else notice that?). There seems to be a permissive attitude that the weapons laws don’t apply to spec ops.
Until the laws change (that is another issue) these guys need to follow the same laws as the rest of us.
Stolen explosives, grenades, pistols, NVG’s, and Class III weapons makes these guys nothing more than smugglers and thieves. These weren’t war trophies, this was stolen government property. The five years they are facing in federal prison (truth in sentencing, they’ll serve 85% even if they behave) won’t be pleasant.
I specially mentioned theft as not being something I agree with.
If they got their hands on battlefield pick ups of explosives they should be able to take those home. As I said before at the time of our founding people owned cannons, mortars, ect. Those are more destructive than a grenade.
If you want to talk about certain thefts how many WW2 1911’s out there were “gained” by the GI taking it home with him?
What have all these strict rules done for us? Is the world a safer place? Are kids able to go play now without fear? Has making criminals out of people who have done the same things people did 50 years ago legally (or were mused over) made us safer?
The gem of this sad story is that the entire investigation was kicked off by some piece of shit wife beater who ratted to avoid doing a little time in county.
Wife beater rat gets off free and clear while the Seal will be made an example of. The Seal perhaps deserves his punishment but so does the wife beat rat.
It was never legal to bring back weapons in war and sell them to foreign countries while bypassing all laws of this land.
This isn’t about NFA violations, he is a military member supplying weapons to hostiles in a foreign country. That brings massive disgrace to his team if its true, however, that is still a big if.
Safer? You bet. The difficulty in acquiring these kinds of explosives is precisely why the criminal use of these explosives and devices do not occur here like they do in other countries. Further, stealing government property was not legal 50 years ago and it isn’t now. Selling grenades or explosives for prospective gang or criminal use is much more dangerous to the public than a guy with a beer can mortar or a black powder cannon. He can’t easily attack a liquor store, 7-11, or police station by pulling a pin and tossing his cannon through the door or rigging a car bomb. These guys dishonored their uniforms and sold out their country for a few thousand dollars; good riddance, I refuse to make excuses for their conduct.
Im not one to condemn someone on the basis of charges, so ill leave that be.
As for the other part of this dicussion, I wholeheartedly agree with the idea that war bring backs should still be legal. Stolen government arms however, should not be.
Laws are there to prosecute people AFTER they do something. They don’t prevent people from doing things.
And you might want to rethink the “that doesn’t happen here” thought. I guess you missed out on the OKC bombing, 93 WTC bombing, Atlanta Olympics, Unibomber, ect. Those are just the high profile cases. Lots of bombings or attempted bombings don’t really make the news like in Hemet CA where the police station had a rocket fired at it, a bomb was found next to a police car, ect.
I dont condone theft, and if they did indeed steal something then they should be charged.
Edit to say DONT condone theft…lol
Because the USGov has done so well handling foreign weapon sales?
I guess all those M2’s, M16’s, rockets, and grenades the cartels are using that were sold by our government at one point don’t count? When is the person who authorized those sales going to end up in court? Oh they just get on TV and blame gun shows/gun owners.
BTW I don’t think its right to take guns back from Iraq, and then sell them to the cartels. I just think its real hypocritical to jump on the bandwagon of crucifying this guy when our own gov has supplied weapons all over the world, and many of them have ended up in some pretty bad hands. Even when I was Iraq we were getting detainees in that were using weapons we got for the IA and IP.
What Im for is allowing soldiers to bring back weapons which has been custom for military’s (incl our own) for a very long time. Im also against the NFA, and think people should be able to own those items. I don’t agree with laws that basically punish the entire populace because a few people have abused our rights in the past at some point.
Federal authorities say they seized C-4 military explosives from the home of a Colorado manaccused of conspiring with a Navy special forces SEAL and a Las Vegas man to smuggle machine guns from Iraq into the U.S. for sale and shipment to Mexico.
he was not caught with them as the way I read it ? his buddy in vegas he was selling the guns to had a friend who was in colorado ? and linked to the other guy in Vegas
so it could be he brought them in and sold to a guy in vegas and the guy in vegas has a buddy who had explosives ?
and the selling to Mexico ? could be good press for them to say SEE bad Americans selling to Mexico !!!
dont know something sounds like a witch hunt on the mexico thing and linking the other stuff to him ? could be wrong not enough facts yet 
bringing back and selling them ? I think selling them on the street is something they should not do cause it could go in the wrong hands !!
if they want to bring them back and stay in their possession I have no problem with that if they can bring back a tank ! and keep it in their possession I am fine with that
its a bad situation for Navy Seals cause this stuff in the general persons eye makes them look bad
if he was selling C4 and other explosives thats not cool though ? keep them for yourself ! again no problem just not selling them on the street
also like others we should be able to if we are honest citizens own whatever we want
nut jobs will figure out a way to blow stuff up without this stuff ? so why penalize the rest of us
This isn’t the case of a guy coming home with a war trophy, but rather a guy scrounging the battlefield for everything and anything to sell.
For this reason I’d vote to convict him, the whole aspect of the 2A being mute the moment it is learned he is charged with selling C4 and other armaments.
I have a huge amount of respect for those who serve, but being Active Duty or Veteran isn’t a free pass to break laws. Last I did check we are a nation of laws.