Suspect faces 10 years in federal prison

A Hyde Park man who was facing local charges for a May incident in which police allegedly spotted him tossing a backpack with a loaded gun onto the roof of a store on Blue Hill Avenue in Mattapan now faces federal gun charges that could send him out of state for up to ten years.

The US Attorney’s office is charging Kerry Charlotin, 30, with being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition for the incident in which Charlotin was nabbed by Boston officers patrolling the area just south of Blue Hill Avenue’s intersection with Morton Street because of complaints from nearby residents about drug dealing and public drinking.

That Charlotin was on the street the afternoon of May 1 at all was because a judge gave him a bit of a break: On May 17, 2018, Charlotin was convicted of assault with a dangerous weapon - a gun - and larceny in West Roxbury Municipal Court. The judge in his case sentenced him to 18 months in the county jail, but suspended all but 114 days, on the presumption Charlotin would stay out of trouble until May 15, 2020. This came after a 2013 conviction in Suffolk Superior Court for larceny from a person, assault and battery and witness intimidation, for which he was sentenced to two years in jail, with all but five months suspended.

It proved to be a mistaken assumption, according to an account by Boston Police and an affidavit by a federal ATF agent assigned to the case:
Around 5:20 p.m. on May 1, officers who were specifically monitoring the parking lot at Fernandes Liquors II at 1212 Blue Hill Ave., noticed that Charlotin and a pal had spotted them and began to hurry away - and into an alleyway that had several “No Trespassing” signs. The officers entered the alley to talk to the two, but this time the pair began to run up Blue Hill Avenue toward Morton Street.

At this time, officers gave chase and pursued the males on foot into a local business at 1186 Blue Hill Ave. The two suspects then fled the area again, but were both located and secured a short time later as officers and detectives continued their investigation into the bag that had been thrown onto the roof of the businesses at 1186. Inside of the bag, officers discovered a Glock 26.9mm firearm loaded with nine rounds of live ammunition.

According to the affidavit, Charlotin initially denied the backpack was his, but then allowed as how he might have had a school book bag. Asked what was in the bag, he replied, “school books.” In addition to the handgun, police found a plastic bag with a fruit - either a papaya or a mango - inside, and lifted one of Charlotin’s fingerprints from the bag.

Police have charged him with unlawful possession of a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition and carrying a loaded firearm.

The federal interest in Charlotin stems from the fact that the gun he’s charged with tossing on the roof somehow got here through international and interstate travel. After being built in Austria, it was shipped to a Glock facility in Smyrna, GA., sold to a licensed gun dealer in Chaplin, SC and then to another licensed dealer in Ohio, which sold it to “a legal purchaser” in Ohio. Somehow, the gun and the ammunition - also manufactured out of state - then made its way to Mattapan; the affidavit does not say how Charlotin might have wound up with it.

In addition to the potential ten-year sentence in federal prison, Charlotin also faces a possible fine of up to $250,000, according to the US Attorney’s office.