On Friday, federal prosecutors levied firearms-related charges against three men arrested in New York and accused of gunrunning into Canada.
Suspects Malik Bromfield, Faizan Ali and Kamal Salman were arrested Thursday and are alleged to have had 89 guns, at least 17 of them previously reported stolen, with them in their car, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York said.
The New York State Police stopped the car, a white Ford Explorer with North Carolina tags rented via Enterprise, on New York State Route 90 in Liberty, New York, over 84 miles northwest of New York City Thursday after seeing the car fail to maintain its lane and switch lanes unsafely, according to the complaint filed against the three suspects.
Mr. Bromfield, the driver and a 22-year-old Canadian national who had last entered the U.S. on Wednesday, initially told one trooper he was driving from New York City up to Syracuse, New York, to visit family.
However, Mr. Ali, a 25-year-old Pakistani national, and Mr. Salman, a 22-year-old citizen of the U.S., Canada and Jordan who last entered the U.S. on his Canadian passport on Feb. 8, told a second trooper they were driving from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, about 24 miles north of Miami.
Mr. Bromfield then changed his story to match theirs, according to the complaint. Prior to the traffic stop, the car had previously been seen by a license plate reader camera on U.S. Interstate 95 in Jupiter, Florida, about 56 miles north of Fort Lauderdale.
Mr. Bromfield declined to let the first troopers search the car, which led them to call for backup. After the backup arrived, a police dog alerted to the presence of narcotics in the car, which prompted troopers to search the vehicle. They found multiple pieces of luggage alleged to contain guns, purportedly found rifles on the floor of the back seat and found about $3,000 in the glove box, according to the complaint.
The complaint did not mention if any narcotics were found in the car to corroborate the smell of drugs the dog picked up on.
In addition, troopers seized Mr. Bromfield’s phone and found an address put into a navigation app for Hammond, New York, a town 189 miles northwest of Liberty that sits right across the St. Lawrence River from the Canadian province of Ontario, according to the complaint.
Prosecutors charged the three suspects with one count each of smuggling from the United States, transporting stolen firearms in interstate commerce, unlawful possession of firearms and unlicensed dealing in firearms.
If they are convicted on the first three of those charges, the suspects face up to 10 years in prison for each charge. If they are convicted of unlicensed dealing in firearms, they face up to five years in prison.
Mr. Bromfield faces an additional charge of unlawful possession of a firearm by an alien, federal prosecutors said. If he is found guilty, he faces up to 15 years in prison.
Mr. Ali, who was using an expired Pakistan driver’s license issued in the name of an Afghan national at the time of the traffic stop, is also wanted on at least four arrest warrants in Canada for alleged crimes, including trafficking in meth and a fatal car crash, according to the complaint.
The complaint did not say when Mr. Ali last entered the United States.
