A U.S. Army vet is facing three years in prison in Canada after mistakenly bringing a gun to the border.
Louis DiNatale says he forgot the gun was inside his wife’s car that he was driving on a weekend getaway to Vancouver when his GPS gave him faulty directions, landing him at the Canadian border, Fox News reported.
When a border agent asked him when the last time he had a weapon on him, Mr. DiNatale responded “earlier that week,” The Los Angeles Times reported. The border agent searched his wife’s car and found a .380 handgun.
He was handcuffed, jailed for four days and posted bail and is due back in court in June.
“It was an honest mistake,” Mr. DiNatale told Postmedia News on Wednesday from Louisville, Ky., where he works as a paralegal. “There’s not even a traffic ticket in my background. Why would I come to Canada to bring a small weapon to smuggle in?”
Mr. DiNatale’s lawyer, Bruce Engel, said that he is being used by Canada to make a statement not to mess with the borders, Fox News reported. Nearly 1,400 firearms were reportedly seized at Canadian entry point over the past three years.
PHOTOS: Top 10 handguns in the U.S.
“They could have done their homework and looked at his background and seen he’s a professional,” Mr. Engel told reporters. “They could have accepted the word of his wife and released him on his own recognizance.”
• Kellan Howell can be reached at khowell@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.