After stealing guns from police car, Kansas City man faces 6 years in federal prison
A Kansas City man who stole guns, Tasers and radios from a police car was sentenced to time in federal prison, officials announced Wednesday.
Carvon Brown, 20, pleaded guilty in September to possessing a stolen firearm, records show. U.S. District Judge Greg Kays on Tuesday sentenced him to six years without parole, U.S. Attorney Tim Garrison announced in a news release Wednesday.
Brown and his co-defendant, Leronte Swinton, were initially charged in the U.S. District Court in Kansas City with illegal possession of stolen firearms after taking an AR-15 rifle, a .40-caliber handgun and a 12-gauge shotgun from an unmarked Kansas City police car sitting in a driveway, court documents show.
Brown admitted they also stole a case of shotgun shells, two Tasers, two handheld radios and two Kevlar vests from the “ransacked” police car on Nov. 9, 2018, according to the release.
Swinton, 31, also of Kansas City, was sentenced on Jan. 30 to two years and six months in federal prison without the possibility of parole, court records show.
At the onset of the theft investigation, police determined the suspects were driving a black Ford Fusion, the same car was involved in “numerous other thefts” that year, court documents alleged.
On Thanksgiving day in 2018, Raymore police were called to investigate reports of numerous thefts from vehicles. Suspects in that case were driving a 2017 Buick Verano.
Police pursued the vehicle, but it eluded them.
On Nov. 27, 2018, officers found both the Buick and a black Ford Fusion parked in the driveway of a house near 77th Street and the Paseo, records show.
Police obtained a warrant to place a GPS tracking device on the Ford. After the device was placed, it was tracked to Leavenworth and Wyandotte counties, connecting Brown and Swinton to numerous other thefts from vehicles, documents show.
The list of additional stolen goods includes handguns, a jump starter kit and a computer tablet, Garrison said.
Officers located the Ford Fusion driven by Swinton with Brown beside him on Dec. 1, 2018. When Kansas City, Kansas, police tried to stop the vehicle, Swinton drove off at a high speed, records show. Police briefly pursued the car, but stopped when it reached Missouri.
Kansas City police picked up the chase, but also terminated the pursuit “due to weather conditions and the reckless manner in which Swinton was driving,” according to Wednesday’s release.
The tracking device showed that the car stopped at two gas stations, and police obtained surveillance videos from those businesses that showed Swinton and Brown in the vehicle, court documents show.
Police then obtained a search warrant and arrested the pair on Dec. 3, 2018, at a residence on 77th Street.
Inside the house, police recovered a 9mm handgun that had been stolen in Kansas City, Kansas, a box of shotgun ammunition, the .40-caliber handgun, a Taser and a rifle case stolen from the patrol car.
