A retired Miami Beach police officer pleaded guilty Friday to selling hundreds of firearms illegally throughout Florida, the Sun Sentinel reports.
Jose Quintana, 55, was arrested in July en route to an Orlando gun show. Officers found him with 120 weapons and $10,000 in cash, the paper reports. At his home, investigators seized 96 rifles, 79 shotguns, 418 handguns, more than 25,000 rounds of ammunition, and $60,000 in cash.
The Palm Beach Post reports that Quintana made $107,946 in cash-only sales of firearms at gun shows in West Palm Beach, Fort Myers, Orlando, Miami and Fort Lauderdale.
Prosecutors say Quintana did so without a federal firearms license -- his expired in 1991 -- nor did he conduct background checks or ask for any paperwork before sales.
During the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms' three-year investigation into Quintana’s activities, undercover officers purchased 11 handguns for $6,115 from different gun shows, NBC 6 reports.
Prosecutors say Quintana made the sales under the guise of a private seller, claiming "that the law allowed him to privately sell a reasonable unspecified quantity of firearms.”
Investigators also believe that Quintana was working with three others, who they know only by their initials, according to the Post. He faces up to three years in prison, a $250,000 fine, and $10,000 to the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms for costs in pursuing him.