AGENTS ARREST 2 IN CANNON SALES.

Byline: Lee Condon and Jesse Hiestand Daily News Staff Writers

Federal agents posing as members of a Colombian drug cartel have arrested two men who used a Van Nuys Airport hangar to broker deals for 30mm cannons used by the military, officials said Tuesday.

Kasi Gabbita was taken into custody about 11:30 a.m. at his Hacienda Heights home and is expected to be arraigned today in U.S. District Court on weapons charges, authorities said.

Also expected to be arraigned today is Steven Picatti, a Boise, Idaho, airplane dealer who was arrested Monday at Van Nuys Airport by agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

More arrests are expected, said John Torres, assistant special agent in charge of the ATF's Los Angeles office.

Picatti had sold one of the automatic cannons to undercover agents for $12,000 in February and was negotiating a deal to sell them four more when he was arrested, Torres said.

``The intent of this weapon is to kill tanks,'' he said. ``The accuracy is at least three miles. This is definitely one of the more exotic pieces of hardware we've seen here in Los Angeles.''

Torres declined to say how agents learned the weapons were for sale, although he said they may have been smuggled through a port in the Pacific Northwest.

Picatti, a pilot who delivers planes for sale through his Boise-based Picatti Aero Services, flew into Burbank Airport on Monday and met there with federal agents, Torres said.

Together, they drove to Van Nuys Airport, where investigators believe Picatti had stashed the cannons in a hangar during the past week, he said.

ATF and U.S. Customs agents have not yet traced the history of the cannons or determined if the men had sold similar arms before, he said.

Picatti and Gabbita have been charged with unlawful transfer of the weapons, a felony charge punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Steve Wolfe.

The British/French-made 30mm Aden cannons can fire 1,200 rounds per minute and are usually mounted on airplanes for air-to-air or air-to-ground combat. The cannons can fire projectiles that can pierce more than 6 inches of steel before exploding inside a target, Torres said.

The U.S. military used this type of cannon on its fleet of British-made Harrier jump jets, which can take off vertically.

``This is a military cannon used by a number of different countries. We don't know exactly where it came from,'' said Barry Caires, the ATF's resident agent in charge of the Van Nuys Field Office. ``It could have changed hands several times.''