Feds: Gun Smugglers Shipped Weapons To Colombian Drug Cartel In Exercise Machines
Feds: Gun Smugglers Shipped Weapons To Colombian Drug Cartel In Exercise Machines
February 16, 2015 - 1:58pm
By Kevin P. Connolly
Orlando Sentinel
ORLANDO, Fla. — They were hidden inside exercise machines.But the secret payloads weren’t for working out.They were for arming South American drug lords.Two Central Florida brothers were recently sentenced in Orlando for their roles in an unusual gun-smuggling plot.Nelson Cartagena, 41, and Dairo Cartagena, 38, both of Rockledge, Fla., smuggled military-style rifles and other firearms inside of motor housings of exercise machines shipped to Colombia, federal authorities said.Many of the guns went to an unknown drug cartel in that country, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida.Orlando-based U.S. District Judge Anne C. Conway sentenced the elder Cartagena to 15 years in federal prison.His younger brother got five years and three months’ behind bars.
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Nelso Cartagena, left, and Dairo Cartagena. [/center]
