CHARLOTTE, N.C. – A convicted felon was sentenced to 151 months in prison today for selling firearms without a license and illegal gun possession, announced Dena J. King, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. In addition to the prison term imposed, Anthony Dewayne Daye, 38, of Statesville, N.C., was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release.
Bennie Mims, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), Charlotte Field Division, Chief Thurman Whisnant of the Hickory Police Department, and Chief David W. Onley of the Statesville Police Department, join U.S. Attorney King in making today’s announcement.
According to court documents and today’s sentencing hearing, between October 2020 and February 2021, Daye sold illegally in and around Statesville more than 20 firearms and ammunition, including rifles, handguns, “ghost guns,” and semiautomatic firearms capable of accepting a large capacity magazine, and aided and abetted in the sale of additional illegal firearms. Court records show that some of the firearms Daye sold had been reported stolen. Daye is not a licensed firearms dealer and he is prohibited from possessing firearms or ammunition due to his multiple prior criminal convictions.
On November 19, 2021, Daye pleaded guilty to dealing in firearms without a license and aiding and abetting and being a convicted felon in possession of firearms.
Daye is currently in federal custody and will be transferred to custody of the federal Bureau of Prisons upon designation of a federal facility.
In making today’s announcement U.S. Attorney King thanked the ATF, the Hickory Police Department, and the Statesville Police Department for their investigation of this case.
Assistant United States Attorney Christopher Hess, of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Charlotte, prosecuted the case.