California college student busted on AW charges; had MySpace pics

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Creeping Incrementalism

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Frequent CalGuns.net poster Matthew Corwin ("Blackwater OPS"), a student at East L.A. College, was arrested a few days ago on "assault weapon" charges. It appears the cops first became interested in him after someone notified them of Corwin's MySpace page right after the VT massacre. The MySpace page has pictures of firearms, knives, and ammo on it. He was an MP in the Army and is currently inactive Army Reserve. Everything on his MySpace web site appears to be legal in CA. The pictures show "off list" ARs--it is possible to buy new AR-15s in this state, but L.E. tends not to know this.

Local News video: http://www.myfoxla.com/myfox/MyFox/pages/sidebar_video.jsp?contentId=3053309&version=1&locale=EN-US

MySpace Page: http://www.myspace.com/sandboxking

CalGuns.net threads: http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/showthread.php?t=56722
http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/showthread.php?t=56684

TV News article (text below) http://www.nbc4.tv/news/13210183/detail.html?dl=headlineclick

MONTEREY PARK, Calif. -- Sheriff's detectives assisted by federal agents raided a Monterey Park home and arrested a man for suspected credit card theft and possession of assault weapons, ammunition and stolen U.S. military hardware, authorities said today.

A sheriff's department statement identified the suspect as 23-year-old Matthew Corwin and said he is the associate president of the student union at East Los Angeles College.

Corwin was arrested by detectives at his residence in the 400 block of Brightwood Street in Monterey Park at 7 p.m. Thursday, said sheriff's Deputy Ed Hernandez. He was being held in lieu of $500,000 bail.

The sequence of events culminating in the raid began with detectives assigned to the Sheriff's College Bureau receiving "information that Corwin possessed numerous illegal weapons at his home in Monterey Park," he said.

The raiding party consisted of sheriff's detectives "assisted" by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the Defense Department, Hernandez said.

Inside the Brightwood Street home, the detectives "located assault weapons, ammunition, and military equipment belonging to the Department of Defense," Hernandez said.

Hernandez said Corwin was booked at the sheriff's East Los Angeles Station, "without any incident," on suspicion of illegal possession of assault weapons and credit card theft.

No details on the confiscated weapons or the credit card case were immediately released.
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Updates as of 5/1, 8:30 PM PDT
  • Corwin Lawyered up with the same firm that helped get the S.F. gun ban overturned
  • Official arraignment has been delayed 2 weeks
  • Still in jail as bail set at $365k; by comparison, rape is $100k, attempted murder is $500k
  • He met with some CalGuns.net folks in court
  • His school has filed a restraining order on him to keep him off campus
  • The stolen credit card charge appears to have disappeared
  • Stolen DoD gear charge is for MOPP suit and/or body armor and a military ID
  • Firearm charges are for semi-auto M1919s (legal in CA) and off-list lowers (legal in CA)
  • Other charges are for a throwing star (which is actually a 4-bladed knife; legal in CA), and a sap glove (no picture of that on MySpace, but considering how laughably wrong the other charges are, this one may be BS as well).
 
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Ive talked to the guy on calguns before.. Cant say I didnt see that coming..
Interestingly enough, he always claimed he wouldnt allow himself to be arrested for something that wasnt illegal.. guess that was just talk.
 
According to CalGuns, he had the CC numbers for a group buy of some sort.
He didnt have stolen military anything and hasnt been charged with any such crimes.
All of his weapons were configured as CA legal. Of course he will have to prove this.

Oh well, can't say I'm sorry to not be living in CA. Pick up another silencer this week.
 
This reminds me why I won't mess around in the "grey area" of AW-Ban here in PRK. I won't get an off list AR or do the no-mag or no-pistol grip thing. And yet another good reason to move. I wonder how much money he'll have to waste to clear his name. A good reason to not list your guns or anything like that online for all to see.
 
The guy is an idiot for putting his business on MySpace. Someone got jealous of what he has and turned him in. MySpace and young people who have no morals will do you in every time!!!

He screamed “HEY look at me!!” and they did...
 
Less mall ninja and more circumspection and he'd never been arrested at all.

Some people never learn. Pics of "The Black Widow?" Grow up.
 
What do you mean by that?
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We went back and forth a couple times because he was absolutely sure of the legality of Off-List rifles. I mean I understand the law and why they're technically legal, but I'd never go around flaunting an OLL rifle or posting it on the Internet or anything.

My argument was when a CA LEO sees an AR-15, whether it be a banned AR or Off-List AR, they are gonna flip out and be like, "OMG ILLEGAL ASSAULT WEAPON!!!ONE@@!!!!!!!!!!" .. The cops here arent spun up on the intracies of CA firearms law. There's been a number of people arrested so far with these rifles. No one has been convicted, but it's been a major PITA everytime.

I have a stag-15 Stripped lower that is currently functioning as a $115 paperweight.. I should sell it and get a hi-point pistol just for ****s and giggles. :)
 
Leatherneck said:
Quote:The raiding party consisted of sheriff's detectives "assisted" by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the Defense Department, Hernandez said.

The Defense Department. ***? In civil law enforcement? What?
Click to expand...

The next paragraph explains it.

"Inside the Brightwood Street home, the detectives "located assault weapons, ammunition, and military equipment belonging to the Department of Defense," Hernandez said."

Look at the word 'assisted' in the previous paragraph. What may have happened was some guy in the DoD was called and asked, "Hey dude, could this be your stuff" and DoD Dude said, "yup. Could be" and that's the extent of the assistance.

Boats said:
Less mall ninja and more circumspection and he'd never been arrested at all.
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Sure, easy to say now. However, if he very honestly thought he was doing no wrong -- IF -- and mySpace or facewhatever is the best way for him to advertise, then what is the big deal?
 
The Defense Department. ***? In civil law enforcement? What?
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Nothing new.. Local LE and military justice often have a working relationship. When I was in the Marines, NCIS or CID routinely accompanied civilian LE when serving warrants on servicemembers. .
 
If there is one thing I have learned in reading articles and comments on their board it is this: If you are going to skirt the edge of the law because you think you can, you need to be prepared for the worst.
 
D@mmit!:mad:

Why is it the younger generation feels compelled to post all their business on the internet?:uhoh: :confused:

I even had to pull one of my officers aside and convince him to rethink the wisdom of putting too much personal information up in public view on his MySpace page.:scrutiny: :rolleyes:
 
Recently the "defendant" led a group buy of 1919A4's The engraving on the side plate is pretty authentic and I wonder if the DoD boys think that it was one of theirs?
 
All of you people so willing to throw this guy to the wolves. All for owning what should be perfectly legal firearms and committing no real crime.

Disgusting.

"He had it coming", "more circumspection", "this guy is an idiot"...

For what? Owning firearms? A Constitutionally protected Right? Or is this another of those "Jim Zumbo" things where we toss the fringes to the wolves to keep the out of control LEO's at bay? How about when they run out of "fringe" folks to persecute and they start coming for you and your Ruger or Remington bolt action hunting rifles?

Short sighted to say the least. Is this what you guys consider "taking the high road"?
 
Basically what I gathered from the news article was that the guy is suspected of stealing credit cards and DOD hardware. The first one is a felony if I'm not mistaken, and the last one is just plain stupid...and probably also a felony. :banghead: Those two alone are enough to get you arested. Now what I couldn't tell is whether the "assault weapons" were DOD owned. Even if they weren't, something he had was probably DOD owned if they're involved.

Can't say I sympathize much.
 
Recently the "defendant" led a group buy of 1919A4's The engraving on the side plate is pretty authentic and I wonder if the DoD boys think that it was one of theirs?
Click to expand...
That could very well be part of the problem.

Re: DOD equipment. I own a pair of PVS-7's and an H3 lensatic compass -- same part numbers as the stuff that was once sold to the Army. Would possession of these possibly result in the same charges if my home was raided for some other reason?
 
I've got a couple of USGI canteen covers, a couple of old ammo pouches, and all my old uniforms. Does this mean I'm a "felon"?

As for collecting card numbers for a group buy of a perfectly legal firearms kit... BFD. I've gone in on 5-6 group guys with the folks over on ARFCOM.

This sounds like more media hyperventilating and BATFE thuggery.
 
Corwin was arrested by detectives at his residence in the 400 block of Brightwood Street in Monterey Park at 7 p.m. Thursday, said sheriff's Deputy Ed Hernandez. He was being held in lieu of $500,000 bail.
Click to expand...

And here is another case of our constitutional rights being violated. Since when is it reasonable for bail to be set so high that you have to sell your house just to give the bondsman his 10%? This is assuming that you can find a bondsman even willing to take this much of a risk, which I doubt. This just effectively denies this man any bail period.
 
Maybe he wanted to be a test case. Not consciously, but some part of his mind thrives on dealing with this sort of adversity. Kind of like how Animal Mother was only a wonderful human being as long as people were throwing hand grenades at him.
 
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