Posted on 11/09/2006 7:57:38 AM PST by Born Conservative
NANTICOKE (PA) — A sign on the front door of D&R Sports Center at 620 Fairchild St. on Wednesday read “Closed for Inspection.”
For most of the day, unmarked vehicles were parked outside the plain white building as federal agents hunted through the sporting goods store for its financial and business records.
On Tuesday, agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, Department of Homeland Security, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement had asked U.S. District Court for a search warrant for the Nanticoke store, managed by Mark Komoroski, and the other D&R Sports Center at 2989 Columbia Blvd., Bloomsburg, Columbia County, managed by Mark’s brother Theodore Komoroski.
The federal agencies allege that since February 2005 the Komoroski brothers have made eight illegal sales of rifles and optics such as night vision devices and gun sights, totaling $247,854, to Russia, Kuwait, Germany and Japan.
Agents at the store referred questions to ATF spokesman
John Hageman of the Philadelphia bureau.
“We’re actually not in a position to discuss what’s going on right now,” Hageman said when contacted. “It’s an ongoing investigation.”
In a call from his home, Mark Komoroski said he and his brother gave the agents everything they needed and, contrary to allegations in the search warrant affidavit, they are properly licensed. Under the Arms Export Control Act, anyone who exports defense-related articles must obtain a license from the U.S. Department of State.
“D&R Sports did absolutely nothing wrong,” Komoroski said. “We have all the licenses, and we provided them to ATF and ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).”
The brothers also sell guns, ammunition, firearm accessories, and other hunting supplies from the D&R Web site. Komoroski estimates international sales make up about half of their business.
According to the affidavit, while assisting the FBI during an earlier unrelated investigation, ATF officers found purchase orders and shipping export declarations for telescopic rifle sights and other optic accessories. The purchaser was Tactica Ltd. of Moscow, Russia, a member of the Vympel group, which the document states is “a known identifier for an elite counterterrorism unit that is controlled by the Russian Federal Security Service (former KGB).”
Tactica principal Sergey Korznikov “is a legitimate Russian dealer over there, and he deals in optics only,” Mark Komoroski said. “We never sold firearms to Russia, or the Taliban.”
Federal agents identified wire transfers from Rockman EOOD and Haji Ibrahim to D&R.
Rockman EOOD in Sofia, Bulgaria, is on the United Nations sanctions list for individuals and companies involved in shipping arms to Liberia. Rockman’s sole owner, Sergei Bout, is the brother of former KGB major Victor Bout, a notorious Russian arms trafficker. Victor Bout participated in selling weapons to “the dictator Charles Taylor in Liberia, rebel groups in Rwanda, and the Taliban,” the affidavit states.
Ibrahim, a citizen of Pakistan believed to be in Kuwait, was indicted by a federal grand jury in 1998 for conspiracy to import heroin into the U.S. from India and distribute it, according to a White House press release from May 2002. At that time, President Bush put Ibrahim on a list of top suspected drug dealers under the “Kingpin Act,” which denies foreign narcotics traffickers access to the U.S. financial system and forbids any kind of trade involving U.S. companies and citizens.
Komoroski said Victor Bout “does not exist,” and believes officials have mistaken Ibrahim for someone else.
“They marked the wrong name down,” Komoroski said. “The people we deal with in Kuwait are 100 percent legitimate government people. We do not deal with any terrorists in Kuwait.”
He added, “I have absolutely no ties to the Taliban. It’s an absolute joke what this has turned into.”
Obviously, when the Taliban turned tables on us in 2001 everything changed. This business of believing the enemy of my enemy is my friend has come back to bite us on the arse.
"The enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy - nothing more, nothing less."
--Howard Taylor
It sound from this as if it's perfectly legal for US gun dealers to make overseas sales willy-nilly under a blanket license. That doesn't sound like a great idea to me, since local gun dealers are rarely in a position to analyze who the ultimate buyer may be in an international transaction. I don't think they should need any license at all to sell domestically, but the American RKBA shouldn't be exploited by foreign parties who may be our enemies.
It's a bad idea to allow any government to disarm anybody, unless those being disarmed are also subject to imprisonment.
Free people have the right to defend themselves, their families, and their communities.
We don't have a right to keep and bear arms because we are free Americans. We are free Americans because we have a right to keep and bear arms.
Indeed, but dealers who are enriching themselves by selling firearms and accessories to sketchy foreign parties are doing nothing to enhance American's freedom, and in some cases are probably seriously undermining it.
Dianne Feinstein has the same attitude towards me. That is why I have had to pay four times (total $100) this year to prove that I am not a criminal in order to purchase firearms.
I suggest that we concentrate on criminal or terrorist behavior and leave the gun control to the liberals.
Selling military supplies to foreign entities has nothing to do with the 2A rights of US citizens.
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