How Did This Convicted Murderer Acquire 80 Guns?

The Salisbury (SC) Post reports local police recently arrested one Jessie Lee Sexton for Possession of a Firearm by a Felon. In 1982, Sexton was convicted of second-degree murder in Mobile, Alabama. After serving five years of a 15-year sentence, the felon was released from prison on parole. Captain John Sifford of the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office told The Truth About Guns that his men acted on an anonymous tip that Sexton had assembled a collection of firearms. On February 10, working with Agent Solomon of The Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), the Sheriff’s men went to Sexton’s Henderson Grove Church Road abode. “Lt. Chad Moose, head of the Criminal Investigation Division for the Sheriff’s Office, said when officers went to Sexton’s house to talk with him, the guns were visible,” the Post reported. “Sexton consented to a search.” Police found a collection of eighty weapons worth an estimated $20,000, including a pre-World War II German Luger prototype [picture after the jump]. And here’s the thing: a post-arrest inventory of the gun’s serial numbers revealed that not one of them was stolen.

So how did Sexton amass his armory? Captain Sifford suggested that the felon “got them from other people.” Sifford told me his office wasn’t launching an investigation into the source of Sexton’s supply and referred me to ATF Agent Solomon (who has not as yet returned TTAG’s calls). As for the confiscated guns, Captain Sifford said their fate was down to the judge in Sexton’s case. “In most cases like this, the guns are destroyed.”