Trenton man gets 5 years for gun buy linked to killing of Dayton detective

A 43-year-old DAYTON —

Trenton man was sentenced Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Dayton to five years in prison for hiring a man to illegally purchase firearms for him.

Arland Mills pleaded guilty in November 2020, and admitted that as part of his scheme, he obtained multiple firearms. Three of those firearms later were seized during a search on Ruskin Road in Dayton after detective Jorge Del Rio of the Dayton Police Department was shot Nov. 4, 2019, as part of a U.S. Drug Enforcement

Administration task force. Del Rio died of his injuries on Nov. 7, 2019.

“Decisions carry consequences, and here, the consequences of Mills’ illegal gun purchases and sales were dire,” Acting U.S. Attorney Vipal J. Patel for the Southern District of Ohio stated in a release.

Delano Wells, 50, of Trenton, bought the firearms from a licensed dealer in Middletown for Mills. Wells was charged with making false statements on a federal firearms form. He lied on an ATF form by indicating he was purchasing the firearms for himself and not anyone else, according to the release.

Once Wells purchased the firearms, he would provide them to Mills, who gave Wells money in addition to the cost of the gun, or he forgave a portion of the debt owed to him by Wells. In all, Wells purchased more than eight firearms on behalf of Mills, according to the release. Wells was sentenced to six months of home detention and three years of supervised release.

As part of Mills’ sentence, he was ordered to pay a $20,000 fine and will forfeit the 28 firearms that the government seized in his case.