Felon sentenced for using 3D-printers to make machine guns

Credit: U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of Mississippi

A Jackson man was sentenced to 168 months in federal prison for being a felon in possession of a firearm and engaging in business as a manufacturer of firearms, announced U.S. Attorney Darren J. LaMarca and Acting Special Agent in Charge Anthony Spotswood of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

According to court documents, Kent Edward Newhouse, 41, possessed firearms on or about July 13, 2022 and July 20, 2022, and engaged in the business of manufacturing firearms from April to July 2022.  In April 2022, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives discovered through a confidential informant that Newhouse was using 3D-printers to manufacture auto-sears, which are firearm components designed to cause semi-automatic firearms to function as fully automatic machine guns.  Under federal law, auto-sears are themselves machine guns.  On July 13, 2022, Newhouse sold a confidential informant a firearm and several auto-sears.  On July 20, 2022, a search warrant was executed at Newhouse’s residence, where additional firearms and auto-sears were located.  The government also obtained videos of Newhouse operating fully functional machine guns.  Newhouse was previously convicted of felony sale of controlled substances in Madison County in 2009.

Newhouse pled guilty on Sept. 1, 2022 to two counts of being a felon in possession of a firearm and one count of engaging in business as a manufacturer of firearms. 

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Jackson Police Department investigated the case.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Bert Carraway and Andrew W. Eichner prosecuted the case.

This case is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a program bringing together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve to reduce violent crime and gun violence, and to make our neighborhoods safer for everyone. On May 26, 2021, the Department launched a violent crime reduction strategy strengthening PSN based on these core principles: fostering trust and legitimacy in our communities, supporting community-based organizations that help prevent violence from occurring in the first place, setting focused and strategic enforcement priorities, and measuring the results.