Thread: Man claims to have smuggled more than 50 AK-47 rifles

Man claims to have smuggled more than 50 AK-47 rifles

February 25, 2011 9:09 AM
By IDELFONSO ORTIZ/The Monitor

HIDALGO — An Edinburg man arrested this week while trying to take a small weapons cache into Mexico told authorities that before his arrest, he had successfully smuggled more than 50 firearms for the Gulf Cartel, court records show.

Lee Roy Perez, 23, was arrested at the Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers and was later charged by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents with one count of exporting firearms, court records show.

Perez was arrested Tuesday afternoon after he drove a maroon 1999 Ford Taurus station wagon to an immigration booth and was referred to a secondary inspection area, according to a CBP news release.

During a search of the vehicle, CBP officers discovered six AK-47 assault rifles and six matching magazines and one .308-caliber assault rifle and its accompanying magazine, records show.

After Perez was arrested, he was turned over to ICE agents, who read him his Miranda rights and interviewed him after he agreed to talk without an attorney present, according to the criminal complaint.

Perez allegedly told the agents that for approximately seven months he had been working for an organization that supplied weapons for the Gulf Cartel in Reynosa. He stated that he expected to receive $300 for successfully smuggling the weapons. During the interview Perez stated that he had allegedly smuggled more than 50 firearms for his employers, the majority of them AK-47 assault rifles.

http://www.valleymorningstar.com/news/h ... ggled.html

This guy burst my bubble. I've been telling everyone the cartels want automatic firing AK47s, not our (U.S.) semi automatic weapons. Now, I'm really bummed out.

ATF?