OFF THE WIRE
BY: Brennan Walsh
wpri.com
U.S. Attorney seeks career criminal charges..
A Patterson, New York man has pleaded guilty to charges of being a felon in possession of a firearm.
Christian Rufino, 40, admitted at the time of his arrest that he was a member of the New York chapter of the Hell's Angels. He was found with a .38 caliber handgun and ammunition in the trunk of his rental car after being pulled over for speeding by Cranston police.
Officers also detected a strong smell of marijuana in the car and upon searching the car they found a small bag of cocaine.
At the hearing, Rufino was informed that the U.S. Attorney is seeking to have him declared an armed career criminal, which could increase his sentence to between 15 years and life imprisonment.
Rufino was previously convicted for an assault and battery with a deadly weapon charge in New Bedford in 1995 and for a bank robbery in Maine in 1990.
He is scheduled to be sentenced at the end of October.
