A Tucson man banned from owning firearms has been sentenced to nearly 16 years in prison for plotting to steal 32 guns that were in police custody.
Phillip Johnson was sentenced for conspiracy, fraudulent schemes and artifices and illegally conducting a criminal enterprise, the Arizona Attorney General's Office said Tuesday. Johnson, a career criminal with numerous felony convictions over 20-plus years, recruited a friend from another state to fly to Tucson and file a false affidavit at the Pima County courthouse in 2017.
In it, the friend claimed to be the owner of the firearms, which had been seized by Tucson Police Department in connection with a previous criminal case.
The friend later picked up the guns from Tucson police in a van that Johnson provided and drove around the city with Johnson following and police officers keeping watch.
People are also reading…
"The Tucson Police Department discovered the scheme and seized the firearms before Johnson took back the van," the attorney general said in a news release
Johnson fled the city last summer as a Tucson jury was debating his fate. He was arrested in California in January.
The friend who took part in the plot, Emanuel Simpson of Michigan, was sentenced last year to two years probation.
