General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTwo AWOL soldiers joined a far-right paramilitary in Ukraine. They returned to kill a couple
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/09/27/awol-soldiers-ukraine-kill-florida-couple/
The listing said, For Sale: Lot of Guns, and Serafin Lorenzo was interested.
The 53-year-old who went by Danny liked to buy expensive items and resell them for a profit, and the cache of guns he found on ARMSLIST.com offered the bargain he was looking for. There were four Glocks, a couple 9mm pistols and nine high-powered rifles. The Florida seller, a guy named Jeremy, wanted just $3,000 cash.
Leaving the country soon, Jeremys listing said. Looking to sale all my guns as I cant take them with me.
Less than 24 hours after inquiring, Lorenzo and his 51-year-old wife, Deana, were on the road from Brooksfield, Fla., late on the night of April 9, 2018, to meet Jeremy at an address just off Corkscrew Road in Estero. At 10:44 p.m., Lorenzo texted: Im at the church.
Minutes later, the Lorenzos were dead.
Police wouldnt find Lorenzo and his wife in the church parking lot until the next morning. Next to Lorenzos body was a bill of sale for 15 firearms and a cellphone that would send the FBI down a wild path stretching halfway around the world leading to the alleged perpetrators.
Starting with little more than the online gun listing and the texts to Lorenzo from a Walmart burner phone, authorities say they learned the gunmen were two ex-Army soldiers bent on joining right-wing paramilitary groups involved in armed conflicts worldwide. The gun listing was true in one respect: They were leaving the country to go to Venezuela to fight the government with the resistance, prosecutors say. The guns were coming with them. They allegedly just wanted the Lorenzos $3,000 to fund the journey.
There is straight up terrorism further down the article, but no mention of the t word since the guys are white Americans, not muslims. They do acknowledge a growing problem of right wing political violence and ex-military being recruited on social media.
malaise
(267,800 posts)to expose these terrorists
genxlib
(5,506 posts)If you submitted it as a movie script, you would get laughed at.
Two takeaways that reference background checks
1. The Lorinzos would still be alive if background checks were universal. These kinds of private sales would not be allowed without a licensed dealer third party. I'm not saying they wouldn't happen illegally but they wouldn't be happening in the open through websites.
2. Second, one of these fuckers was caught with a background check.
IronLionZion
(45,256 posts)for point 1, making it harder to do and more official also adds an element of safety to everyone involved. I bet a lot of dangerous characters go through private sales with one party having no idea who they're dealing with.
central scrutinizer
(11,617 posts)Grifters trying to grift other grifters and the whole thing goes sideways.
UniteFightBack
(8,231 posts)of sunlight for this shit.
blm
(112,919 posts)Has been leading quite publicly since 2014. Its grown immensely since Trump.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/03/world/americas/alt-right-vladimir-putin.html
eppur_se_muova
(36,227 posts)iluvtennis
(19,757 posts)Bernardo de La Paz
(48,786 posts)Saving a thousand or two is not worth the risk, ya think?
IronLionZion
(45,256 posts)for when you need "lots of guns" really fast and don't have time for background checks through a licensed dealer.