WASHINGTON — Convicted gun smuggler John Phillip Hernandez wasn't the kind of customer Bushmaster Firearms International had in mind when he bought 14 of its .223-caliber AR-15s at Houston-area gun shops in 2006 and 2007.
Bushmaster describes itself as a “leading supplier” of AR-15 rifles, a civilian clone of the U.S. military's standard-issue M16, “for law enforcement, security and private-consumer use.”
But the weapons Hernandez and his associates bought wound up in the hands of gunmen from Mexican drug cartels, including a Bushmaster .223 that was among the weapons used to kill four police officers and three secretaries in Acapulco, an attack dubbed “the Acapulco police massacre.”
A Hearst Newspapers survey of 1,585 guns bought mostly in Texas and Arizona that were either shipped to Mexico or intercepted en route shows that the .223 AR-15 ranks second among firearms used and coveted for drug warfare.
The survey is drawn from guns identified by manufacturer or importer in U.S. court documents from 44 cases involving 165 defendants across the country, showing the purveyors of guns to Mexican drug traffickers followed a time-honored saying of product salesmanship: Bigger is definitely better.
The Bushmaster .223 comes with a 30-round magazine, enabling the shooter to fire all 30 rounds, one for each pull of the trigger, in less than a minute.
“The gun traffickers supplying Mexican drug organizations have become more selective and sophisticated in the weapons they acquire,” said Kristen Rand, legislative director of the Washington-based Violence Policy Center, which has studied the issue extensively. “Their goal is the bulk purchase of maximum firepower.”
Fearful that U.S. weapons purchases on behalf of Mexican drug cartels might fuel a new round of calls for gun control, gun-right advocates argue that current laws are sufficient to control such trafficking.
“The brand names are inconsequential. What matters is that our laws aren't being enforced,” said Andrew Arulanandam, director of public affairs for the National Rifle Association. “We have adequate laws on the books. If someone is breaking the law, go after them. If not, they should be left alone. That's the NRA position.”
Bound for Mexico
The No. 1 gun on the Hearst survey, a brand of AK-47 imported from Romania, has an ammunition capacity similar to that of the Bushmaster. Among Mexican traffickers, it has earned the nickname cuerno de chivo, or “goat horn,” because of its distinctive banana-shaped magazine.
Since a federal law banning assault weapons expired in 2004, so-called “straw purchasers” have flooded U.S. gun stores in the Southwest, mostly in Texas and Arizona, sweeping up these and other weapons. Court documents show such purchasers buying as many as 20 AK-47s at a time, paying as much as $11,000 in cash.
The weapons are sold legally but the buyers must sign a U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives document saying they're buying the guns for themselves. “Straw” purchases for others are violations of federal firearms law.
Typically, the purchaser turns the guns over to a broker who takes them across the border to Mexico, where such weapons can't be bought legally. Once in Mexico, the weapons are sold to the cartels, often for three or four times the original price.
Violence in Mexico has claimed almost 40,000 lives since Mexican President Felipe Calderón took office in December 2006 and declared a crackdown on the powerful drug-trafficking organizations. Mexican authorities have recovered more than 60,000 weapons.
Top ATF officials have said in congressional testimony that 90 percent of the guns submitted for tracing by Mexican authorities are from the United States.
Gun-rights advocates doubt the accuracy of that claim, arguing Mexico submits a fraction of the weapons it recovers for tracing.
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