MEMPHIS, Tenn — A man is facing more than five years in federal prison after helping with a railroad car burglary and carrying a machine gun.
According to the United States Attorney's Office for the Western District of Tennessee, several people broke into railroad cars carrying retail merchandise destined for California on March 4, 2022.
Authorities caught one of the suspects, 35-year-old Lawrence Anthony, who had been found carrying a pistol, modified into a machine gun. The other suspects escaped, taking merchandise worth more than $7,500 with them.
Anthony was arrested again months later by the Memphis Police Department on Aug. 18, 2022, after allegedly selling liquor from a home in Memphis, the attorney’s office said. The liquor had been stolen from a business a few hours earlier. Officers also found a pistol in the home, and Anthony confessed that the weapon belonged to him, according to the attorney’s office.
Anthony pled guilty to a four-count indictment on July 20, 2023, that charged him with aiding and abetting burglary, possessing a machine gun, and being a felon in possession of a firearm. He was sentenced to 66 months in federal prison on Nov. 30, 2023.
