A 30-year-old Bridgeport man who stole 111 guns from the Smith & Wesson manufacturing plant in Springfield, Massachusetts and sold many of them on the streets has been sentenced to more than 17 years in prison.
Elliot Perez was sentenced on Tuesday to 210 months in prison, or 17-and-a-half years, followed by three years of supervised release.
Officials said one of the guns was used in a murder in Bridgeport and more than 50 of these guns are still unaccounted for.
“This defendant not only stole more than 100 firearms, but he quickly sold dozens of them on the street putting them directly into the hands of criminals,” U.S. Attorney Deirdre Daly said in a statement. “Not only are the stolen guns now turning up in criminal investigations as far away as North Carolina, but one was used in a Bridgeport murder and another in a shooting at a Hartford night club.”
Federal authorities said Perez was a truck driver for Pace Motor Lines at the time, and picked up five boxes of guns from the Smith & Wesson manufacturing plant in Springfield and placed the boxes in his truck.
He also stole three additional boxes, containing a total of 111 firearms, then drove the truck filled with the guns his home in Bridgeport, where he met his another man, according to authorities.
Then he delivered the original five boxes of guns to the trucking company’s distribution center in Stratford.
Local
Perez has been in custody since his state arrest on Nov. 23, 2012 and pleaded guilty in February 2014 to one count of conspiracy to possess and sell stolen firearms, one count of possession of firearms by a convicted felon and one count of making a false statement to a federal law enforcement officer.
