Made-in-Mexico 'Ghost Guns' Find Way to Cartels
ARMS TRAFFICKING
/29 APR 2022
BY SCOTT MISTLER-FERGUSON
A US national who received smuggled AR-15 parts in Mexico and assembled the weapons for two of the country's most violent cartels shows that such firearms, known as ghost guns, have the potential to become a part of cartel arsenals.
Andrew Scott Pierson, of Oklahoma, had parts for AR-15 weapons smuggled to his auto repair shop in the Mexico border city of Nuevo Laredo, where he converted them into functioning weapons used by the Jalisco Cartel New Generation (Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación - CJNG) and the Northeast Cartel (Cartel del Noreste - CDN), according to a sentencing memo filed in a US federal court in Arkansas. Pierson received a 12-year prison sentence on April 20 for his role in the arms trafficking conspiracy, in which he ordered the firearm parts on the internet, had them delivered to Laredo, Texas, and then had them transported over the border.
When authorities raided Pierson's shop in 2018, they discovered a slew of parts and machinery used to manufacture and complete so-called ghost guns, including metal bending presses for assault rifle receivers and partly milled AR-15 and AK receivers.The assault weapons even came with a counterfeit label of Colt, the top gun manufacturer in the US.
Weapons assembled in Mexico have been used in past cartel shootings. The CJNG gunmen in the dramatic 2020 assassination attempt of Mexico City Police Chief Omar Garcia Harfuch used some weapons that were built in-country, according to a March Milenio report in which officials with the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) were consulted.
More:
https://insightcrime.org/news/made-in-mexico-ghost-guns-find-way-to-cartels/