Source: United States Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF)
DETROIT – Akeem Richards-Crawford, 31, Dwayne Harrison, 34, and Jannai Stewart, 35, citizens of Canada, were charged today in an indictment with conspiracy to smuggle and the smuggling of firearms and firearm magazines from the United States to Canada, announced United States Attorney Jerome F. Gorgon, Jr.
Gorgon was joined in the announcement by Assistant Attorney General for National Security John A. Eisenberg, Acting Special Agent in Charge Jared Murphey, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations Detroit, Director of Field Operations Marty C. Raybon, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Chief Patrol Agent John R. Morris, U.S. Border Patrol, Special Agent in Charge James Deir, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and Aaron Tambrini, Special Agent in Charge of Office of Export Enforcement’s Chicago Field Office, U.S. Department of Commerce.
According to the indictment, Richards-Crawford and Harrison traveled from Canada to the United States in October 2023. Richards-Crawford and/or Harrison then rented a vehicle and a hotel room in the Detroit-Metropolitan area, traveled to Houston, Texas and Cincinnati, Ohio to obtain firearms, and then returned to the Eastern District of Michigan to execute their smuggling scheme. Then, early in the morning on October 26, 2023, Richards-Crawford and Harrison drove to the Algonac, Michigan area with a backpack containing 36 firearms. Harrison then boarded a jet ski on the St. Clair river and traveled to Canada with the firearms. When Harrison arrived in Canada, he approached an unmarked police vehicle believing it was there to pick him up. After realizing his mistake, Harrison dropped the backpack and fled on foot. Canadian law enforcement officers located the backpack and recovered 36 firearms, each individually wrapped in tube socks. Officers also encountered Stewart—Harrison’s actual pickup driver—nearby after Harrison texted him: “Come get me” and “Cops came.”
Based on the charges in the indictment, each defendant faces up to 10 years in prison for each smuggling count, and up to 5 years in prison on the conspiracy count, if convicted.
The public is reminded that an Indictment is not evidence of guilt. The defendants are presumed innocent and entitled to a fair trial at which the government has the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
The case is being investigated by Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), U.S. Border Patrol, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Department of Commerce, Bureau of Industry and Security, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and Canada’s Ontario Provincial Police, and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Douglas Salzenstein and Erin Ramamurthy, along with Chantelle Dial, Trial Attorney, Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, United States Department of Justice.