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Sen. Leland “Bullet Button Loophole” Yee Arrested On Corruption Charges (Updated)

March 26, 2014 by 9 Comments

California St. Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) who has led the fight to close the “bullet button loophole”  was arrested by the FBI today on public corruption charges including bribery.

From the AP:

A California state senator who was lauded for his efforts to make government more transparent was arrested Wednesday along with a onetime gang leader known as “Shrimp Boy” during a series of raids by the FBI in Sacramento and the San Francisco Bay Area, authorities said.

FBI spokesman Peter Lee confirmed the arrests of State Sen. Leland Yee and Raymond Chow, but declined to discuss the charges, citing an ongoing investigation. Yee was scheduled to be arraigned in federal court in San Francisco later Wednesday.

Yee was one of three Democrats running to be California Secretary of State. One of his opponents blamed the arrest on the need to raise money for campaigns.

Democrat Derek Cressman, who is one of several candidates also running for secretary of state, released the folowing statement:

“Coming on the heels of the corruption charges of Senator Calderon and the conviction of Senator Wright, today’s actions need to be a wake up call. We are clearly beyond the point of looking at one bad apple and instead looking at a corrupt institution in the California senate,” Cressman said. “The constant begging for campaign cash clearly has a corrosive effect on a person’s soul and the only solution is to get big money out of our politics once and for all.”

Corrosive effect on a person’s soul? Oh, please. As for his confederate who was arrested at the same time, Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow, he was indicted in the 1990s for racketeering involving both teenage prostitution and trading in heroin. He later served 11 years of a 25 to life sentence on gun charges.

UPDATE: It gets better. What could be the worst charge that you could think of for an anti-gun politician like Leland Yee? Yep, arms trafficking.

In addition to being charged with wire fraud of honest services, Sen. Yee, along with his political consultant Keith Jackson and Wilson Sy Lim, are being charged with violating Sec. 922(a)(1) and Sec. 922(1). They are charged with conspiracy to deal firearms without a license and to illegally import firearms.

According to the criminal complaint, Yee told an undercover FBI agent that he would introduce him to an arms dealer he had known for many years. Yee went on to say that the weapons would be sourced from Russia. He asked the undercover agent if he wanted automatic or semiautomatic firearms. When the agent replied “automatic”, Yee said that wouldn’t be a problem. (see p. 84) The smuggled firearms would come through the Port of Newark, New Jersey. Yee was to get $100,000 for facilitating the first transaction valued at somewhere between $500,000 and $2.5 million.

All I can say is that Leland Yee is a hypocrite of the worst sort.

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9 thoughts on “Sen. Leland “Bullet Button Loophole” Yee Arrested On Corruption Charges (Updated)”

  1. An additional part of the complaint was "arms trafficking". Another corrupt politician pushing gun control. …shocking….

  5. Sounds like a solid MAIG candidate, once he's out of prison. Might be a (small) step down from State Senator, but….

  7. Now if we can only get these rats to roll on their corrupt Senate buddies like Steinberg, deLeon, Hancock, Skinner and Jackson. What do you call the Democratic caucus of the CA Senate on a cruise ship at the bottom of the Pacific? A good start… to returning California to Californians.

  9. Now days the smuggling of firearm is in rise. So, it is very important that there should be serious steps taken by the government to stop these firearm smuggling. Firearm dealer who sell the firearm to criminals should be arrested.

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