Mexican gang shooters love the Barrett .50 cal

[Hispeed1]

Assault weapons are being smuggled illegally to Mexico from the U.S.-easier to get. Mexican gang shooters love the Barrett .50 cal rifle for its abilities.
"In Juarez, Mexico, just across the border from El Paso, Texas, a police commander was gunned down in front of his home. The weapon used to kill Cmdr. Francisco Ledesma Salazar is believed to have been a .50-caliber rifle. ATF special agent Tom Mangan says the .50-caliber rifle has become one of the "guns of choice" for the drug cartels. The weapon fires palm-sized .50-caliber rounds that can cut through just about anything.
Mangan showed CNN the power of the rifle on a gun range near Phoenix, Arizona. The weapon, a Barrett, was seized in an ATF raid. A round fired from 100 yards away tore through a car door and both sides of a bulletproof vest like those used by Mexican police.
"There's nothing that's going to stop this round," Mangan says.
The rifle was intercepted as it was being smuggled into Mexico. Mangan says investigators believe four others already had passed through the border."

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/03/26/gun.smuggling/index.html

[SMGLee]

Not sure what this has anything to do with Equipment and gear, it is more of a political statement about moving forward to ban the 50cal than anything else.

Liberal chip away at your freedom one little step at a time. slowly little bit of info at a time, sooner or later this aslow stream of info will sink in and you would feel a thing when they take away your rights one bit at a time.

It isn't really about the 50cal rifle, it is about our border security and about how poorly we run the drug war aginst a cartel based in a country with deeply rooted corruption.


this is more politics not about gear. get that straight, or you just use this to help the gun ban hystria.

[StukaJr]

RIP to the officer.

The rest of the article is garbage - I won't seep through it... Typical drive by journalism and personal opinions of a lone ATF agent taken out of context.

I'd appreciate if this was moved to Off Topic - the baseless allegations of 4 guns smuggled into Mexico and are somehow the favorite of every Mexican hoodlum (what, do they stand in line to stroke it) are sensational yet empty news...

One more reason to build a wall...

[SMGLee]

I'd appreciate if this was moved to Off Topic - the baseless allegations of 4 guns smuggled into Mexico and are somehow the favorite of every Mexican hoodlum (what, do they stand in line to stroke it) are sensational yet empty news...

One more reason to build a wall...

Exactly, but people don't read in details, they just read the head lines, so pretty soon that headline of 50cal used by the gang members will be implanted in their head... just like how Hispeed use it as the topic heading in this thread... this just makes me sick.....SICK!!

[Paulinski]

I completely agree. RIP to the officer while the rest of the article is typical Lieberal agenda.

[Hispeed1]

Ok. Please just close this. I am not for gun control-I love shooting guns. Sorry so many people thought this was a post about gun control. To quote SMGLee, this is about how poor "our border security is and about how poorly we run the drug war aginst a cartel based in a country with deeply rooted corruption."

[StukaJr]

Video is a little more disturbing than the article:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/03/26/gun.smuggling/index.html#cnnSTCVideo

So the ATF is staking out gun shows near Mexico's border and arrest people that buy large quantities of ammunition and weapons, "girlfriends on cellphones bringing buyer's cash"... There is description of what agents look for but absolutely no say in the grounds of the charges - finding the gun one wants and saying "honey, could you run to the ATM so the deal does not get snapped up by someone else" is not a crime...

And the "storage facility full of guns" is just that - it's against the law but it's not enough to support smuggling operation... jeez

Hope that BATFE Congressional Hearings and the proposed legislation reigns them into going after the bad guys and not invent criminal activity...