A Boston man has copped a plea in a scheme to smuggle guns from down South into Massachusetts, feds say. Kobe Smith, 25, admitted to being part of a conspiracy to traffic firearms from Alabama to Boston, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Smith's guilty plea to the single count of gun conspiracy comes after a federal grand jury indictment that named him and three other men in July of 2022. The crew worked to quickly get their hands on at least 24 firearms, some of which were later found scattered around Boston and its suburbs. Smith placed the orders while his co-conspirators made the trips to gather the weapons, according to the announcement by Acting United States Attorney Joshua S. Levy and James M. Ferguson of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Jahquel Pringle, Jarmori Brown, and Brandon Moore were also charged in the conspiracy. In two separate voyages in 2020, Pringle and eventually Brown too, traveled by bus to Alabama to transport the firearms back, hidden in their luggage. Smith's sentencing is set for June 12, with his co-defendants awaiting theirs.
Chief Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV is expected to lay down a sentence that could include up to five years behind bars along with three years of supervision after release and a fine that may stretch to $250,000. The case falls under Project Safe Neighborhoods, a sweeping initiative targeting violent crime and specifically gun violence, aimed to build safer communities through tighter law enforcement networking and outreach. Brown has already been sentenced, in July 2023, to spend 18 months in prison followed by supervised release according to the same press release from the U.S. Attorney's Office.
The crackdown is a piece of an ongoing strategy announced in May 2021, to curb violent crime tied to firearms. This federal push aims to foster trust between communities and law enforcement, support organizations geared towards preventing violence before it erupts, and set targeted enforcement priorities while measuring outcomes of these efforts.
