A courageous undercover NYPD detective sealed the deal on a big firearms bust in The Bronx — posing as a buyer for a delivery of 16 handguns and high-capacity “drum magazines” from Florida, officials said.
The two traffickers met with the undercover at an apartment on Tinton Avenue last August, and laid out six firearms and six magazines on a bed, according to an indictment announced Thursday.
The undercover handed over $7,000. The traffickers then hopped into an Uber, only to be surrounded and arrested a block away.
One of them had a backpack — inside was more guns, plus a high-capacity magazine that holds 50 rounds.
The magazine would turn a 9-mm handgun into a mass-shooting machine, capable of firing 50 bullets in 30 seconds without reloading, said Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark.
The undercover had met with one of the traffickers previously, in a pizzeria parking lot on Westchester Avenue on Dec. 18, 2017, paying $5,900 for six guns and 12 magazines, including another one with a 50-round drum.
“Bringing these criminals to justice is dangerous work,” noted NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill, who credited members of the Firearms Investigation Unit for “taking incredible risks each day.”
Defendants Andre “Hollywood” Smithson, 24, of Kissimmee, Florida, and Isaiah Jones, 22, of Haines City, Florida, face 128 counts of criminal sale of a firearm and other charges, officials said.