Guns, which were recovered by WEDGE during drug operation or drug search warrants.

A career train burglar was sentenced to 132 months in federal prison on Nov. 2 for his part in the theft of 104 handguns from a rail car in April 2015.

Patrick Edwards, 38, aka “Big Pat,” was one of 11 men charged with stealing the guns, valued at $51,000, from a rail car parked in a rail yard in Avalon Park on the city’s South Side.

Meanwhile, the head of a suburban gang crime task force says that while gun violence remains a major problem in the Chicago area, authorities have made serious progress in beefing up rail-yard security.

Federal prosecutors say the train Edwards and others robbed was carrying 318 firearms from the Ruger factory in New Hampshire. It had parked in the yard for the night before continuing on to Spokane, Wash.

Edwards, whom prosecutors called “a multi-convicted felon who has made a career out of stealing from cargo trains,” faced 20 years in prison. He has a long criminal history, with six prior convictions related to the theft of cargo from rail cars dating back to 2006.

Edwards, who entered into a plea agreement with federal prosecutors in May, is the sixth person to be sentenced in the theft. Prosecutors had asked that he be sentenced to 151 months.

According to court documents, Edwards and the others spent around six hours looting the rail car’s contents. Only the rising of the sun stopped the thieves from stealing more of the guns. About 7 a.m. that day, a railroad employee noticed that several locks and seals on the train had been cut open. Agents from the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) met the train in Spokane and discovered the theft.

After leaving the rail yard, the thieves met at a nearby stash house to divide up the stolen weapons, with Edwards receiving 13 guns. Authorities say Edwards sold all the guns he received. Police have recovered just 34 of the 104 stolen weapons.

Thefts from rail cars parked in yards in high crime Chicago neighborhoods are a chronic problem. A recent WGN television investigation that inspected five years of Chicago Police records found that parked trains had been burglarized “more than 400 times over that period.”

Thieves have no way of knowing exactly what is in any rail car they target; cargo can be anything from gym shoes to electronics. But sometimes its lethal firepower that quickly finds its way into the hands of street gangs in Chicago and the suburbs.

A quick look on the internet shows the extent of the problem. In December, 2009, burglars stole 319 guns from a rail car parked at 116th and Torrence Avenue. In May 2014, 13 Smith & Wesson M&P15 Sport rifles were stolen from a rail yard at 61st and Lafayette. And in September 2016, six AR 15-type assault rifles and 27 handguns were stolen from a rail car in a yard at 77th and Avalon.

Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel, who is also chairman of the multi-jurisdictional West Suburban Enhanced Drug Enforcement task force, or WEDGE, said stolen guns are frequently recovered by police responding to criminal activity.

Prosecutors hammered away at the havoc Edward’s actions have wrought on the Chicago area.

“No efforts by law enforcement to stop the senseless killings in this City by keeping guns out of the hands of felons will be successful when there are individuals like the defendant and his codefendants who are willing to profit off of illegal arms trafficking in Chicago,” the prosecution wrote in a sentencing memorandum.

“The remaining 70 illegal firearms are still floating around the City and will unfortunately continue to show up at crime scenes for many years to come.”

Within just six days of the April 2015 burglary, prosecutors said, three of the stolen guns were recovered during traffic stops or residence searches. Authorities listed 19 instances between April 2015 and May 2017 where Chicago and suburban police recovered guns stolen in the April 2015 burglary.

Noting the ongoing media coverage of Chicago’s epidemic of shootings and deaths — 480 people have been killed and more than 2,800 people shot so far in 2017— prosecutors said Chicago “is in a very dark place at this time.”

One suspect arrested after a stolen Ruger was found in his car told police, “It’s a war going on over here, y’all ain’t going to protect us, my friend just got popped 10 times. It ain’t safe over here that’s why that’s in the car, but it ain’t mine.”

Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel, who is also chairman of the multi-jurisdictional West Suburban Enhanced Drug Enforcement task force, or WEDGE, said such stolen guns are frequently recovered by police responding to criminal activity.

“You’ll see them pop up in future crimes,” he said of the stolen fire arms. He said WEDGE officers focus on two things beside the arrest of criminals- seizing drugs and confiscating firearms.

“If we’re making a drug arrest, you can take it to the bank that they’re armed,” Weitzel said. While the weapons are mainly intended to protect dealers from other predatory street gangs, he said, “they won’t blink an eye about using them at law enforcement.”

Weitzel said the biggest problem with the theft of weapons being shipped to legal dealers is that they are difficult to track. The ATF, he said, has the serial numbers of guns intended for dealers, but when they are stolen, those serial numbers cannot be traced to the subsequent illegal owners.

In the case of the April 2015 burglary, Weitzel said, the ATF issued “massive amounts of warning to local police departments. They keep us updated all the time.”

Weitzel said the railroad yard security situation has improved since that 2015 burglary. He said he was the keynote speaker at a gathering of the Chicago Railroad Special Agents Association last week, where the issue was discussed.

“There’ve been a lot of changes,” he said. “Federal railroad police have made significant enhancements to yard security and policing of their yards.”

While he declined to be more specific due to security concerns, Weitzel said the yard improvements, “are across all the railroads.”

— Cook County rail car burglar sentenced to 11 years for gun thefts —