PA Bill Number: HB335
Title: In inchoate crimes, further providing for prohibited offensive weapons.
Description: In inchoate crimes, further providing for prohibited offensive weapons. ...
Last Action: Removed from table
Last Action Date: May 1, 2024
Man sentenced for selling guns stolen from Powhatan pawn shop to alleged NYC gang member :: 11/04/2015
A Midlothian man who sold 10 firearms stolen from a Powhatan County pawn shop to an alleged Bloods gang member in New York City was sentenced to 6½ years in prison Tuesday.
William C. Grieger, 23, of the 12300 block of Leesburg Court, pleaded guilty in August to receiving, possessing and selling stolen firearms; possession of an unregistered firearm; and to possessing a sawed-off shotgun.
Grieger, also an admitted cocaine and heroin dealer, faced up to 10 years in prison for each charge when sentenced by U.S. District Judge John A. Gibney Jr., although federal sentencing guidelines call for a term of roughly six to more than seven years.
The 30 firearms were stolen early on the morning of May 18 in a break-in at the American Family Pawn Shop at 2427 Anderson Highway in Powhatan.
Grieger admitted to authorities that he bought 11 of 30 stolen handguns — each capable of accommodating magazines of 15 or more rounds — for $4,000. It was learned in court Tuesday the guns were for Grieger’s New York City drug supplier.
One gun and some cocaine were recovered when Grieger admitted to investigators what he had done and told authorities where to find them. The 10 guns that went to New York are still unaccounted for as are 12 of the 19 other stolen firearms.
“This is a very serious and very dangerous offense,” Gibney said shortly before sentencing Grieger. The business of selling stolen firearms, said the judge, “It’s not just amoral, it’s immoral.”
“It’s pretty clear people don’t buy stolen weapons to go to target practice. They buy them to shoot people with,” Gibney said.
Given a chance to speak before he was sentenced, Grieger apologized to Kevin Penrose, the owner of the business. “I did my best to get your guns back that came into my possession,” he said.
Penrose told Gibney it was the first time a crime had been committed at his business and it has made him less trustful of people.
Penrose said there is now a stigma about his business. People tell him they are sorry for what happened “and then they ask me what happened to the guns.”
“I have to tell them I don’t know. I wish I could tell them I got them back,” he said. He said he is upset with himself for not having better security. But, he said he did not think it was necessary — “I was out in the country.”
Penrose added, “those are my guns that are now in New York and on the streets. ... I feel responsible.”
In pleading guilty, Grieger admitted he bought the firearms on May 18 knowing they had been stolen earlier that day. Grieger was in New York City when he used his cellphone to arrange the deal.
He returned to Virginia, bought the guns and then, accompanied by his girlfriend, another man and a 5-year-old child, drove to Maryland, where he sold them to the alleged gang member.
“They are gone,” Angela Mastandrea-Miller, an assistant U.S. attorney told Gibney of the 10 guns.
When first questioned by investigators, Grieger initially denied purchasing and selling the firearms until he was confronted with evidence against him. He also admitted possessing the sawed-off shotgun.
Prosecutors asked for a sentence at the top of the guidelines. They said a stolen firearm was recovered with cocaine that Grieger had purchased from his supplier but he was never charged with possession of a firearm in furtherance of his drug trafficking activities.
“The defendant is an admitted drug trafficker, who not only sold stolen, high-capacity firearms to a gang member in another state, but he was also involved in the distribution of cocaine,” the government argued in court papers.
But Grieger’s lawyer, John A. March, asked for a sentence under six years. “There is no question that Mr. Grieger’s charges are very serious,” said March.
However, he said Grieger cooperated with investigators who would not have found the stolen gun and cocaine had he not told them where it was.
“To use that against him is unfair,” said March. “The facts may be true but that’s not playing fair.”
Mastandrea-Miller countered that authorities already knew that Grieger was selling drugs before he admitted he was.
Three others, Meleke Osborne, 21, Jonathan Thorne, 20, Jerell Broadie, 22, have pleaded guilty to stealing the firearms in the break-in and are set to be sentenced later this month.
http://www.richmond.com/news/local/crime/article_55a3a228-5679-50eb-b3cc-3d3560ab0ecd.html
