March 31, 2026

Prosecutors Endanger Communities by Going Soft on Repeated Illegal Straw Purchasers of Firearms

By Larry Keane

NSSF^®, The Firearm Industry Trade Association, could not be more serious about preventing the crime of illegal straw purchasing. That’s when someone who isn’t prohibited from owning a firearm lies on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive (ATF) Form 4473 when buying a firearm and declares they are purchasing the gun for their own use when they actually intend to sell or give it to someone else who is prohibited or is an illegal firearms trafficker who does not want their name associated with the transaction. That is a serious crime and should be treated as such.

Illegal straw purchases are not victimless crimes. The recent lone wolf terrorist tragedy at Virginia’s Old Dominion University demonstrates why prosecutors should be held accountable when their lax prosecutions directly lead to greater tragedies involving criminal firearm misuse — especially when guns are obtained through illegal straw purchases.

Maddening Development

Nearly three weeks ago, Mohamed Jalloh, walked into an ROTC training session at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Va., and opened fire, shooting a .22-caliber handgun he purchased the night before for $100 from an acquaintance who is a serial straw purchaser. Tragically, Army Lt. Col. Brandon Shah, who was teaching the class, was murdered. Two other students were wounded. According to The Virginian-Pilot, “several students tackled Jalloh, with one of them pulling a knife and stabbing him to death.”

The entire incident is a tragedy. But then more information immediately came to light regarding how exactly Jalloh obtained his firearm after law enforcement officials began their investigation. Using text message and phone call records, authorities linked Jalloh with Kenya Chapman, who provided the alleged murderer with the .22-caliber handgun the night before the shooting. According to an ATF affidavit, Chapman obtained the particular firearm by stealing it from the glove box of an unlocked car last year.

Chapman is now in police custody and facing several charges. But it’s his long criminal history of illegally providing firearms to would-be criminals and prosecutors’ soft treatment of him that is truly enraging.

Several Priors, Off Easy

Once law enforcement connected Jalloh to Chapman and discovered his record of illegally providing firearms to criminals, the soft-on-crime prosecutors connected to Chapman have become known and are going to need to answer some very tough questions.

A judge denied Chapman bond at his hearing after noting his long past of illegal straw purchases and supplying firearms to would-be criminals who went on to commit heinous crimes with those guns — including homicide.

According to the ATF affidavit filed on March 13, Chapman purchased three different 9mm handguns in Virginia in the spring and summer of 2021, all purchased at different firearm retailer locations, seemingly suggesting he filled out the proper ATF paperwork marking the ATF Form 4473 box declaring he was purchasing the firearms for himself. The first firearm was recovered by the Newport News Police in a drunk-in-public incident in June of 2021. Police later recovered two handguns from a Newport News homicide scene in September 2021 — one that an 18-year-old man had used in a shooting and another that had been on the waist of a surviving victim.

How did Chapman’s arrest fair just five years ago? He was required to write an “apology letter” to federal agents at the time, but Chapman was never charged!

That’s three times he illegally supplied firearms to other individuals who later committed crimes or were involved in the commission of a crime and no jail time. Just an apology letter.

Incredulously, Chapman’s attorneys are again asking for leniency, insisting Chapman “had no idea” the gun would be used in a crime and was “just as shocked” as they were at Jalloh’s attack.

Spare us all.

Answers Needed Now

As investigators continue piecing the puzzle together of how exactly Chapman was treated with such kid gloves during the past recent years, hard questions need to be asked of those who let him off.

After all, in a “non-custodial interview” with police following the 2021 homicides, Chapman admitted to investigators he illegally straw purchased all three firearms. In all, that means Chapman’s three gun purchases in 2021 could have carried a combined potential punishment of up to 45 years behind bars if charged and convicted.

According to additional local reporting, plenty of people are dodging accountability.

One report noted that “… the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia — which oversees federal prosecutions here — would not explain last week why Chapman was not charged at the time,” The Virginian-Pilot reported. “The Newport News Police, which joined the ATF in interviewing Chapman about the gun buys in October 2021, also would not explain the lack of charges.”

The Virginian-Pilot again summarizes the lack of accountability succinctly. “An assistant U.S. Attorney based in Newport News wrote a ‘declination memo’ in the case on Nov. 18, 2022, saying ‘the investigation’ against Chapman was no longer being pursued.”

That’s not all. “The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia — which prosecutes local cases brought by ATF — declined this week to explain why Chapman was not charged with any straw purchasing crimes in 2021.”

ATF referred the case to the U.S. Attorney’s office for prosecution and that office “declined to prosecute” the case.  America deserves to know why.

Industry Efforts to Prevent Illegal Straw Purchases

NSSF’s “Don’t Lie for the Other Guy™” campaign has worked for more than 25 years to educate the public and drive home the message that anyone making an illegal firearm purchase faces a federal felony penalty of up to 15 years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines. The program is primarily funded by the firearm industry but has also been complemented by federal funding allocated to ATF by Congress beginning in 2022.

The firearm industry adamantly stands by our efforts to keep firearms out of the hands of those who shouldn’t possess them and that means being tough on those who break the law to provide guns to those who aren’t able to purchase them on their own.

If Chapman had been put behind bars several years ago for illegally supplying not one, not two, but three different firearms to would-be criminals, it’s highly likely innocent Americans — such as Lt. Col. Shah — would still be alive today.

As gun control activists continually seek to impose new and stiffer restrictions on the firearm industry and law-abiding gun owners, it is maddening to then see criminals committing serious crimes involving a firearm after they are let off easy with zero accountability.

Shame on all who treat those like Chapman with kid gloves.

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