livingston
20×102mm Vulcan
Tucson gun-smuggling case: ‘Every family member had a .50 cal’
A foiled gun-smuggling attempt in Nogales, Arizona, and a daring raid at an airstrip in Sinaloa, Mexico, led U.S. authorities to a gun shop on Tucson’s northwest side.
Along the way, federal agents encountered rifles powerful enough to take down a helicopter, two phony home invasions, dozens of fraudulent gun sale records, and a former Tucson police officer accused of stealing the identities of people he arrested as part of a scheme to smuggle guns across the border.
Joe Santiago Valles, a Tucson police officer from 2012 to 2014, was sentenced July 6 in U.S. District Court in Tucson to 6½ years in federal prison after pleading guilty to 30 counts of falsifying federal firearm records, identity theft and witness tampering. The prosecution of alleged co-conspirator Timothy Veninga, who was a federally licensed firearms dealer, is ongoing.
Federal agent in Tucson gun-smuggling case: ‘Every family member had a .50 cal’
A foiled gun-smuggling attempt in Nogales, Arizona, and a daring raid at an airstrip in Sinaloa, Mexico, led U.S. authorities to a gun shop on Tucson’s northwest side.
Along the way, federal agents encountered rifles powerful enough to take down a helicopter, two phony home invasions, dozens of fraudulent gun sale records, and a former Tucson police officer accused of stealing the identities of people he arrested as part of a scheme to smuggle guns across the border.
Joe Santiago Valles, a Tucson police officer from 2012 to 2014, was sentenced July 6 in U.S. District Court in Tucson to 6½ years in federal prison after pleading guilty to 30 counts of falsifying federal firearm records, identity theft and witness tampering. The prosecution of alleged co-conspirator Timothy Veninga, who was a federally licensed firearms dealer, is ongoing.
Federal agent in Tucson gun-smuggling case: ‘Every family member had a .50 cal’
