ILLEGAL GUNS; BLACK MARKET SALES TRACED TO VALLEY TRAFFICKER.

Byline: Greg Gittrich Daily News Staff Writer

When deputies stopped a Ford Bronco outside a crowded West Hollywood nightclub, they found TV actor Omar Gooding behind the wheel and three handguns missing serial numbers on the seat.

Using new, sophisticated technology, ATF agents painstakingly identified the guns and traced them back to a cache of more than 1,200 weapons an illegal immigrant bought with a forged gun dealer's license.

In turn, that led them to a 365-pound Northridge man and two other illegal dealers who had sold the weapons to San Fernando Valley gangs, the Mexican Mafia, drive-by shooters, a bank robber - and Gooding, younger brother of Oscar-winning actor Cuba Gooding Jr.

Since then, authorities have recovered 59 of the 1,200 guns in what they say is a shocking story of black market gunrunning in Los Angeles - a trail of crime facilitated by the ease with which criminals can get weapons.

``This is very typical of the type of gun trafficking that's going on right now in Los Angeles,'' said John Torres, assistant special agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms' Los Angeles Field Division.

``These guns were being used in crimes in the San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles and near San Diego literally within a week after they were purchased illegally. They hit the street extremely quickly. They were brand new and most of them were not small-caliber handguns.''

Despite a new Los Angeles law that limits buyers to one gun purchase a month as part of a nationwide push for stronger gun laws, thousands of these weapons continue to reach criminals and children, Torres said.

Contrary to a long-held presumption, criminals don't need to steal their guns or buy them across state lines, according to a new analysis by the ATF, the most comprehensive study of its kind. Rather, a growing portion of the guns used in crimes taken from juveniles and felons in Los Angeles are less than three years old and bought from gun shops but then resold to people who otherwise couldn't buy them legally.

Like the ones that ended up in the Valley.

Not so `Smart Guy'

The massive gunrunning ring began unraveling Nov. 25, 1995, at 2 a.m. when sheriff's deputies in the West Hollywood station got an anonymous telephone call.

``We got a report that these guys in a car on Sunset Boulevard had at least one gun,'' recalled Deputy Mark Gayman.

Gayman and his partner stopped the Ford Bronco parked outside a nightclub on the crowded boulevard. The deputy had no idea the driver was Gooding, a 22-year-old Sherman Oaks actor from TV's ``The Smart Guy.''

``When the crowd outside the nightclub saw who we were arresting, we nearly had a riot on our hands,'' Gayman said. ``They were throwing bottles and rocks, and yelling the normal stuff at us. We had to call for backup from LAPD and Beverly Hills. It wasn't a good situation.''

Inside the Bronco were three handguns, all with obliterated serial numbers.

According to court records, Gooding pleaded no contest to possessing a firearm with an obliterated serial number. He was fined $500 and placed on probation for 18 months.

Gooding and his publicist declined to comment.

He also refused to tell deputies where he got the guns, two Sundance .25-caliber handguns and a late-model Sterling pistol. Without his help, the chances of tracing the guns taken from Gooding's car looked bleak because the serial numbers appeared to be chiseled off, deputies said.

Nevertheless, Detective Lawrence Hastings forwarded the firearms to the ATF National Tracing Center in West Virginia.

Finding the source

In the following months, federal agents raised the serial numbers on one of the Sundance models, tracing the gun to J&J Loan, a pawn shop on Florence Avenue in Los Angeles.

After reviewing records from the federal firearm license assigned to the shop, Torres said, investigators discovered the handgun was one of 1,200 firearms purchased between May 1995 and March 1996 by the retailer.

The shop, however, had been closed during that entire period, Torres said.

``A former employee, Manuel Sycip, stole the license and doctored it,'' Torres said. ``The shop's owners had no idea what he was doing.''

According to court papers, Sycip came to the United States from the Philippines on a special visa in 1991 to obtain medical treatment for his daughter. After the visa expired, he illegally remained in the country and got a job at J&J Loan.

When the owner died, Sycip started his own gun business, federal agents said.

ATF Special Agent Thomas Makar led a search of Sycip's Temple City apartment June 4, 1996. The task force seized 30 firearms, as well as electric grinding tools found ``on a vise in a bedroom that had been converted into a firearms and ammunition workshop.''

Investigators believe Sycip clamped each gun into the vice and ground off the weapons' serial numbers before peddling them to three main distributors.

The handiwork makes the weapons nearly untraceable and allowed Sycip to sell the guns for as much as seven times the wholesale value, federal agents said.

Between October 1995 and March 1996, Sycip had bought 51 packages from a wholesaler in Sparks, Nev., and paid about $36,000 in COD charges for the majority of the weapons, according to United Parcel Service receipts seized by the agents.

Investigators also found records detailing illegal purchases from a Selma, Ala., gun dealer.

The stockpile consisted of Jennings 9 mm, Jennings .380-caliber, Sundance .25-caliber and Phoenix Arms Raven .25-caliber handguns - all made by a ring of notorious gun manufacturers south of Los Angeles.

In August 1996, Sycip pleaded guilty to one count of dealing, importing and manufacturing firearms without a license. He was sentenced to 30 months in state prison and two years of supervised probation, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Borthwick.

Sycip has since returned to the Philippines, but not before providing agents with a trail to follow.

``He kept fairly detailed records of all the transactions. He gave us a pretty clear idea of where the guns were going,'' Borthwick said.

According to federal investigators, Sycip sold slightly more than 400 weapons to two people who hawked the firearms to gangs throughout Southern California and the Mexican Mafia.

One of those people is dead.

Another is under investigation.

Agents refused to release the names of either suspect and significant details about the cases. ``But most of the weapons were going to one guy, Kahir `Tim' Helo,'' Borthwick said.

Valley connection

Kahir Helo - a 365-pound man with lifelong kidney disease and a nickel-and-dime criminal past - routinely rendezvoused with Sycip in supermarket parking lots across the Valley, purchasing 785 of the handguns, federal agents said.

According to Makar, investigators have a record of more than 200 calls from the Sun Valley gasoline station where Helo worked to Sycip's home.

Helo, 27, sold the guns primarily to Glendale gang members; one of his customers was a bank robber who held up the First Interstate Bank in Escondido on Jan. 31, 1996, officials said.

After surrendering to authorities in September, Helo pleaded guilty to one count of dealing firearms without a license and one count of possession of a firearm with removed or altered serial numbers, officials said.

A medical report submitted to the court in his defense described Helo as ``morbidly obese,'' ``very fragile'' and ``roly-poly'' in recent years due to his kidney problems.

Dr. Michael Blumenkrantz claimed incarceration ``would result in severe medical and psychiatric trauma,'' possibly contributing to the gunrunner's ``demise.''

In a groveling apology letter to a federal judge, Helo sought mercy, saying his crimes were all just a big mistake.

``If you would be able to look into my heart for one second you would see that I don't have the heart of a criminal, but the heart of someone who made a big mistake and regrets it at every waking moment,'' Helo wrote.

Confined to a federal prison medical center in Springfield, Mo., Helo is serving an 18-month sentence and will be under supervised probation for two years after his release. He receives daily dialysis treatments to keep him alive.

While in prison, he is not eligible for a kidney transplant. He could not be reached for comment.

``To say that Helo received a harsh sentence is absurd,'' said the ATF's Torres. ``I am pleased to say that the system worked in this case.''

``Firearms trafficking is an evil crime,'' he said. ``Being the father of two boys, I take it seriously when a firearms trafficker illegally dumps these things on the street for the simple motive of greed.''

Tracing crime

Agents continue to search for the remainder of the 1,200 guns. At the time deputies stopped Gooding and found the guns, nothing required them to submit them to the ATF for tracing.

In fact, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department and Los Angeles Police Department didn't start tracing all guns used in crimes until last year, and two months ago California became only the second state to pass legislation requiring law enforcement officials to trace every recovered weapon.

It is becoming a national movement.

Startled by the ATF gun trafficking report, President Clinton proposed in February to add more money to the federal budget to enable more cities to perform comprehensive tracing. Currently only 27 cities, including Los Angeles, trace all recovered firearms.

``We've started submitting more traces to the ATF. It gives us a better picture of what's happening in terms of where the guns are coming from. We also have a better idea where they're ending up,'' said Detective Steven Mulldorfer, commander of the LAPD Gun Unit.

The ATF's Torres said modern computer technology has become ``the Achilles' heel of today's gun traffickers,'' and that Hastings' long shot paid off.

Daily News Staff Writer Peter Hartlaub contributed to this article.

HOW TO HELP

Any information concerning illegal firearms purchases or prohibited individuals in possession of firearms can be reported to the ATF at (800) ATF-GUNS.

ANATOMY OF GUN TRAFFICKING

The path of some 1,200 illegal, inexpensive hanguns began at gun manufacturers south of Los Angeles and in a matter of months led to San Fernando Valley streets, where they were used in an array of crimes. Only 59 have been recovered.

1) Crates containing some 1,200 inexpensive handguns leave factories south of Los Angeles.

2) J&J Loan Pawn Shop, Florence Avenue, Los Angeles: 5/95 to 3/96

3) Manuel Sycip

From 10/95 to 5/96, pawnshop employee filed off the guns' serial numbers and sold the weapons illegally in three batches.

Customer 1

Kahir `Tim' Helo: 798 guns

Northridge resident, sold guns out of father's Sun Valley gas station.

Customer 2

Undisclosed identity - Dead

300 guns sold to gangs in the Valley and Southern California

Customer 3

Undisclosed identity

102 guns sold to people with Mexican Mafia ties.

Guns seized after:

1. Glendale gang arrests, 11/95-6/96

2. Escondido bank robber, 1/96

3. Tip that led to actor Omar Gooding, 11/95

4. Baldwin Park drive-by shootings, 9/95

CAPTION(S):

Box

BOX: ANATOMY OF GUN TRAFFICKING (see text)

SOURCE: ATF

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