Bloomberg reveals largest gun seizure ever in New York

(RT) New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Monday that his administration has successfully carried out the largest gun seizure in the city’s history.

At a Monday morning press conference, Mayor Bloomberg and Police Department Commissioner Ray Kelly announced that authorities in New York have managed to indict and arrest 19 individuals believed responsible for running an illegal gun pipeline from North and South Carolina to NYC along the Interstate 95 corridor.

As the result of an undercover investigation, Bloomberg said city officials netted the largest gun bust ever to come out of New York, collecting more than 250 illegal firearms, including high capacity assault weapons, a fully automatic machine gun and guns that are commonly used in violent crimes across the city.

“There is no doubt that the seizure of these guns has saved lives,” Mayor Bloomberg said at the press conference. “New York City, I’m happy to say, is the safest big city in the nation. We’re continuing to make our city even safer.”

Commissioner Kelly said the firearm pipeline was discovered last year as the result of an unrelated narcotics investigation targeting an operation thought to be trafficking drugs out of Brooklyn. That probe led investigators to a 26-year-old aspiring rapper, Matthew Best, who recorded songs from an Ocean Hill, Brooklyn recording studio in which he boasted of “packing more guns than the Air Force.”

Once Best was brought onto the police’s radar, law enforcement linked him to 29-year-old Walter Walker of Sanford, South Carolina. Walker, according to police, purchased stolen guns cheaply in North and South Carolina, and then took a discounted bus to New York City where he sold them with the assistance of Best. In one instance, police said, Walker carried as many as 14 guns in his luggage while he took public transportation from North Carolina up to New York.

“Those who were selling the guns to Walker knew they were intended for distribution in New York, and they knew that the guns were illegal in New York,” Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan said at the presser.

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