Judge orders prison time for ex-Adair police chief who sought dozens of machine guns

A former small-town Iowa police chief will go to prison for five years after he was convicted of lying to federal officials in an attempt to stockpile machine guns.

Bradley Wendt, who led the three-man Adair Police Department, also owned a gun store and was licensed to buy and sell machine guns. He was indicted in 2022 on charges that he had lied to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives on forms needed to obtain approval for such transactions, falsely claiming that guns would be sold for use by, or demonstration to, the police department.

In fact, prosecutors said, he sought to obtain or transfer scores of machine guns, including a rotary minigun usually mounted on military helicopters — far more weapons than his tiny department could ever plausibly need or use. In total Wendt received 10 weapons for the department, some of which were resold for profit, and 13 more for his own store, as well as signing letters to help other gun dealers around the country obtain approval for machine gun purchases.

At his trial in February, Wendt testified he'd consulted with ATF officials in advance and believed all of his transactions were legal. But prosecutors said many of the transactions in question were obviously not for the police department's benefit. They showed texts and emails messages in which Wendt bragged to friends about using his position as chief to acquire guns, and said he wanted to get as many as possible before retiring and then sell them for profit.

Prosecutors ask for seven-year sentence

Wendt was convicted of 11 charges, including false statements and conspiracy, and acquitted of several other counts. The jury also found he illegally possessed a machine gun when he took an M60 heavy machine gun owned by the department to a shooting event sponsored by his gun store more than 50 miles from Adair.

At his sentencing Monday, prosecutor Mikaela Shotwell said Wendt's conduct was "not a mistake, not an honest misunderstanding" of the law.

She also highlighted Wendt's attitude throughout the proceedings, including derogatory posts on his company's Facebook page against federal investigators and continuing his efforts to obtain restricted guns up until the week before his trial.

Defense attorney says probation adequate for deterrence

Defense attorney Nick Klinefeldt said that unlike other cases where officials have wrongfully obtained guns, Wendt obtained proper authorization for every transfer and that all the guns involved where recovered from where they were supposed to be. He also stressed Wendt's long career in law enforcement and running multiple businesses, his family ties including three young children, and numerous letters of support from Adair officials and other police officers.

"He's lost his job, he's lost his career as a law enforcement officer, he'll lose his business, he'll lose the ability to pursue his passion of hunting... there's significant financial loss. He's losing everything," Klinefeldt said.

Federal sentencing guidelines recommended a range of 78 to 97 months in prison for Wendt. Shotwell asked Judge Stephen Locher to sentence him within that range to 84 months, or seven years, while Klinefeldt urged the court to sentence him to probation.

'It is important to set an example,' judge says of prison sentence

Locher instead sentenced Wendt to 60 months in prison and ordered him to pay a $50,000 fine, saying Wendt's actions represented "an abuse of a position of trust" and that, whether or not Wendt had filed the right paperwork for his purchases, he clearly had set out to mislead federal regulators.

"You seem to think that if you just said some magic words to the ATF, then that made whatever you did OK, even if some of what you said wasn't true," Locher told Wendt before sentencing him. "It is important to set an example that you just can't say whatever you want to a government agency."

Locher said he was varying down from the guideline range because it penalized Wendt for the more than 25 guns involved in Wendt's scheme. In most gun trafficking cases, that guideline anticipates those weapons being used to commit other crimes, he said.

"I don't have any evidence you ever threatened or brandished any of the weapons," Locher said, calling Wendt "an enthusiast" who went too far in building his collection.

Case means change for ATF, gun industry, lawyers say

Locher also criticized the ATF's actions, pointing out that the agency continued to approve dozens of transfers at Wendt's request over three years, only to later decide the transfers were improper. Shotwell told the court the agency at the time had no procedures to check for suspicious repeat transfer requests.

"This case highlighted to the ATF that the law letter process was being abused, and they have updated their procedures and now have enhanced verifications," she said.

Klinefeldt, in requesting a sentence of probation, also pointed to what he said is a major deterring impact the case has already had on other gun dealers.

"The impact this has had on the industry is huge," he said. "Nobody wants to wind up where Brad Wendt is right now."

Klinefeldt has suggested Wendt plans to appeal on a number of issues, including whether he was authorized to use the city's machine gun for his gun store's event, and whether his statements to the ATF were materially false under the law.

William Morris covers courts for the Des Moines Register. He can be contacted at wrmorris2@registermedia.com or 715-573-8166.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Ex-Iowa police chief who lied to ATF about machine guns sent to prison