The Specialized Federal Unit for the Investigation of Illicit Activities Related to Firearms, Explosives, and other Controlled Materials (UFIARM), issued a report warning about the increase in straw buyers or “fictitious purchasers” of firearms. These individuals legally acquire weapons on the market to be illicitly transferred to unauthorized third parties.
The body, led by Deputy Attorney General Gabriel González Da Silva, has prepared a new technical document titled “Risk Indicators Related to Firearms Straw Buyers,” which systematizes information gathered from various preliminary investigations and seeks to provide tools for the early detection of diversion schemes of weapons into the illegal market.
The report highlights that this is a phenomenon of growing relevance. Straw buyers, being legitimate users, “acquire firearms in the legal market to be illicitly transferred to unauthorized third parties, which, it cannot be ruled out, may be linked to criminal organizations.”
Based on confirmed cases of this new modality, UFIARM identified behavioral patterns in the detected schemes and, on that basis, presented a non-exhaustive list of risk indicators that can guide the work of prosecutor's offices, as well as other agencies linked to the control, detection, prosecution, and adjudication of these maneuvers.
From the Fiscales portal, they indicate that among the identified indicators, “factors related to the declared address, the contributory capacity, the quantity and type of weapons acquired —including periodicity—, and the whereabouts or destination of the weapons stand out.”
The document emphasizes that while some conduct may fall under the criminal figure of illegal transfer of weapons (article 189 bis of the Penal Code), “in many cases, they are complex and organized schemes in which multiple actors participate — legitimate users, facilitators, gun shops, and criminal organizations.”
Authorities maintain that this scenario involves maneuvers that may involve other crimes, such as forgery of public documents, illicit association, or smuggling.
“With this work, UFIARM seeks to strengthen institutional capacities in the identification and prevention of diversions of controlled material, promoting inter-institutional cooperation and articulated research in the face of possible criminal networks that put citizen security at risk,” they express.
