A New Jersey actor faces 10 years in prison for using an Airsoft gun while filming a movie (Photo: MoreToyGuns.com)
New Jersey’s bizarre gun laws have struck again. An actor who used a pellet gun while filming a movie now faces 10 years behind bars on felony possession of a firearm charges.
Carlo Goias, whose screen name is Carlo Bellario, was recently filming “Vendetta Games” when he was arrested in a residential neighborhood for having an Airsoft gun. The Toms River resident was holding a plastic toy outside a vehicle during a chase scene, which prompted some 9-1-1 calls. He was then forced to spend four days in jail while trying to raise $10,000 bail.
“I was shooting a movie – I wasn’t committing a crime intentionally,” Goias told the Associated Press on Wednesday. “Robert De Niro doesn’t ask Marty Scorsese if he has gun permits. We’re actors. That’s for the production company to worry about.”
Goias rejected a plea deal offer Tuesday that would have resulted in less than one year in prison. Prosecutors said prior convictions for theft and burglary could result in a ten-year sentence.
“I pretended to shoot out the window; they were going to dub in the sound later,” Goias said. “We get back, and within a couple of minutes we’re surrounded by cop cars.”
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James O’Neill, a spokesman for the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office, declined to comment because the case is still pending.
“It’s true that Goias hasn’t exactly been an angel, and with his record, no state would allow him to possess firearms,” the conservative website Hotair responded Thursday. “However, in other states, no one would have accused Goias of doing so. A pellet gun does not use gunpowder, so it’s not a firearm — except in New Jersey. The Airsoft gun Goias had doesn’t even fire metal pellets – it fires nonlethal plastic pellets under power of compressed air. It’s a prop, not a threat.”
Goias’ plight echoes the case of Shaneen Allen, a single mother and legal gun-owner from Pennsylvania who was pulled over in Hamilton, New Jersey, on Oct. 1, 2013, and spent over a over a month in jail. She faced up to 10 years in prison despite having a valid concealed carry permit. She was luckily pardoned by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie in April 2015.
“There has to be a safety valve that prosecutors have, so these cases can be quickly dealt with,” Jef Henninger, Goias’s defense attorney, told AP.
RELATED:
Where’s Chris Christie on Jersey’s inane gun laws?
New Jersey: Free Shaneen Allen!
New York pulls trigger on toy-gun control
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