Côte-des-Neiges man sentenced for stockpile of AK47 parts
A 49-year-old man who was found to be in possession of the parts required to assemble enough automatic assault rifles to supply a small army was sentenced on Friday to an overall 10-year prison term.
Anatoliy Vdovin, a man who was prone to rude outbursts while two of his criminal cases were before the courts, shrugged off the sentence Quebec Court Judge Linda Despots delivered at the Montreal courthouse and reminded her that he has requested an appeal of her decision to convict him.
In February 2015, a Montreal police investigator received a call from a member of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) based in Alabama. The ATF agent used the internet to pose as someone interested in purchasing parts for AK47s, an automatic assault rifle originally designed for the Soviet Army.
The ATF agent first ordered five receivers, the body of the rifle, and rails and received a package that originated from Montreal. When the agent paid for the items, he learned the payment was sent through a PayPal account linked to Vdovin.
In the weeks that followed, the Montreal police placed Vdovin and St-Léonard resident Vitaly Pohrebniak, 51, under surveillance.
That led investigators to a storage locker on Notre Dame St. Vdovin was arrested on the spot while holding packages containing more rifle parts that were about the be shipped to the ATF agent in Birmingham, Ala.
According to the decision Despots delivered on Friday, when police searched the locker they seized “a considerable number of receivers, silencers, large-capacity magazines as well as parts, tools, plans and instructions needed to make automatic or semi-automatic AK47s.”
When police searched Vdovin’s home on Lacombe St. they found evidence linked to the shipments sent to Alabama and a design plan for an AK47 receiver.
Vdovin was ultimately found to be in possession of 900 receivers, 180 silencers and around 25 largecapacity magazines.
Éric MacKay, an RCMP expert on firearms who testified during Vdovin’s trial said: “the extraordinary quantity of AK47 (receivers) is most remarkable. To my knowledge it is unique.
“I can only imagine the damage caused by the manufacture and distribution of these firearms on the black market.”
The expert also said that, because of the way the parts were manufactured, a rifle assembled with them would have been impossible to trace.
Vdovin’s only defence at trial was that he believed he had a right to sell the parts. He acted as his own lawyer after he was convicted, on May 3, on counts related to possession and trafficking of firearms and prohibited devices.
Pohrebniak was acquitted because Despots determined there was no evidence to indicate he knew what Vdovin was selling.
Having already served 63 months, Vdovin has 57 months remaining on his prison term.