Dena King, who is the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina, stated that a man has been charged with gun trafficking.
According to the charges, Joshua Herman Phillips, 39, of Claremont, North Carolina, sold 23 guns in Catawba County between July and August 2008.
Some of these weapons were pistols and AR-15-style rifles. Phillips was also accused of having a privately made gun that was a style rifle fired in 7.62 x 39, which is known as a machine gun.
King said that this case is being handled under the new crime rules of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which was passed by Congress and signed by the president in June 2022. The act is the first federal law that is especially meant to stop illegal gun trafficking and “straw purchases.”
“Our top priority is to keep the people of the Western District of North Carolina safe,” U.S. Attorney King said. “We want to cut down on violent crime and get rid of illegal guns from our streets.”
Our main goal, along with our federal, state, local, and Tribal law enforcement partners, is to investigate and bring to justice people who are a threat to the community, spread violence and drugs in our neighborhoods, trade or have illegal guns, and make violent crime more common.