(Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)
A Chicago man who pleaded guilty to drug and gun charges has been sentenced to 15 years in prison in a case federal prosecutors said has shut down a Missouri-to-Chicago firearms pipeline.
Derrick Claiborne, 47, was sentenced in Chicago’s federal court this month after prosecutors said law enforcement found narcotics and three illegal firearms inside his penthouse apartment on Michigan Avenue.
“This case is an excellent example of how the Firearms Trafficking Strike Force, working together with the Chicago Police Department and the U.S. Attorney’s Office, stops the flow of illegal guns into our neighborhoods,” Christopher Amon, special agent-in-charge of the Chicago Field Division of ATF, said in a statement. “Prosecuting those responsible for trafficking these firearms makes our community safer.”
Claiborne is one of four people convicted as part of an ATF-led investigation, which revealed Claiborne had purchased three additional firearms from James Saunders after those weapons had been transported from Missouri to Saunders’ Woodlawn neighborhood home.
In the prosecution’s sentencing memorandum, they detail a text conversation between Claiborne and Saunders on Nov. 1, 2018, that included Saunders texting a picture of three firearms along with a message that stated “2000.”
ATF investigators then observed Claiborne drive to Saunders’ apartment building, before Saunders entered Claiborne’s vehicle carrying “a large white bag,” according to prosecutors. When Saunders exited the vehicle less than a minute later, he was no longer carrying the bag, prosecutors said.
Law enforcement pulled over Claiborne moments later, recovered the three guns and arrested him on a charge of felon in possession of a firearm. Later that month on Nov. 28, ATF investigators executed a search warrant at Claiborne’s South Michigan Avenue home, where they recovered more than a kilogram of fentanyl-laced heroin and three other firearms, according to prosecutors.
Prosecutors said that in addition to the firearms he sold to Claiborne, Saunders also sold multiple firearms to confidential informants who were cooperating with law enforcement. He previously pleaded guilty and was sentenced in 2019 to five years in federal prison.
Two others from Missouri — 25-year-old Jumonta Moore and 30-year-old Marcus Ingram — were also convicted of transporting firearms from that state to Saunders in Chicago. They were each sentenced in 2019 to three years in federal prison.
“Firearms traffickers enable unlawful possession of guns and the violence that may follow,” Acting U.S. Attorney Morris Pasqual said in a statement. “We will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to investigate and hold accountable individuals or groups who traffic firearms into Chicago.”
Contact Matt Masterson: @ByMattMasterson | [email protected] | (773) 509-5431
