NYC doorman worked double duty as gun trafficker at Midtown office building: NYPD
A New York City doorman was ready to roll out the welcome mat for crooks looking to buy illegal guns at the Midtown building where he worked, authorities said Tuesday.
Prosecutors hit Roberto Carmona and his Tennessee-based associate Harold Floran with a 141-count indictment accusing them of selling 80 guns and ammunition to an undercover NYPD detective, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said.
“Roberto Carmona allegedly used his job as a doorman to operate a highly illegal, one-man gun show out of the Midtown building where he worked – storing ammunition in his locker and selling multiple deadly weapons outside,” said Vance.
“Mr. Carmona is also accused of bringing his work home with him, selling dozens of guns outside the Morningside Heights building where he lived.”
Carmona allegedly sold five guns to an undercover at the building on W. 55th St. near Ninth Ave. where he works. He sold another 10 guns at the building where he lives and is the super, authorities said. Authorities were alerted by a tipster who walked into the 25th Precinct stationhouse with information on the illegal gun sales.
Carmona sold 63 semi-automatic pistols, 11 revolvers, two assault rifles, two rifles, one sawed-off shotgun and one shotgun, Vance and NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea said. The astonishing amount of sales all occurred this year.
“When just think about a role of a doorman, they’re the protector of the building...it’s almost like a betrayal of the building, betrayal of the people inside who rely on someone like that to make sure the building is safe,” said a 32-year-old worker at the office building who declined to give his name.
Shea and Vance displayed dozens of the firearms at a press conference, including a Dirty Harry .45 revolver, seven long guns, and 28 handguns.
“I don’t see guns on this table,” Shea said. “What I see is victims. I see kids gunned down in the street. I see mothers standing at funerals.”
Carmona, 51, stashed the stockpile in his locker at work and sold them to the undercover outside for anywhere between $500 to $3,700 a pop, according to court docs.
Charged with trafficking the guns to New York City are Alan Goode, 30, and Melvyn McDonald, 41. They bought the firearms legally down south and then illegally sold them to Floran, who transported the weapons to Carmona in Virginia, New Jersey, and sometimes Tennessee, prosecutors say.
When Floran made the gun sales, he knew the feds in Tennessee were investigating him for his suspected connection to the gun used in a fatal April 2020 Harlem shooting, which occurred in front of an 8-year-old boy, the NYPD said.
All four men were indicted for illegal sales of firearms, weapons possession, conspiracy and other related charges.
New York authorities have for years lamented the “Iron Pipeline” that brings guns from southern states with loose gun laws to the city.
Vance, who said the press conference was likely to be his last as Manhattan DA, bemoaned the failure to enact stricter gun laws in other states. He said the alleged scheme underscores the need for legislation to impose harsh prison sentences on people convicted of trafficking 20 or more guns a year.
Shea said the city continues to see a “seemingly endless stream of guns.” An alarming 1,471 people have been shot in New York City this year.
“That doesn’t even begin to tell the impact of guns. Instances where shots are fired, and it traumatizes the block. Or you think of someone shot and is lost and how it effects the whole family,” said Shea.
“These are the guns that wind up in 15-year-olds’ hands. And nothing will come from that except devastation.”
With Nicholas Williams
