A man who buried stolen guns snatched from a trailer parked at a hotel after a Portland gun show in 2022 was sentenced Tuesday to the three months that he already served in jail.
Federal agents deployed a dog named Moby to help find some of the guns in the backyard of Mario Arturo Tamayo’s home in the 5200 block of Northeast 75th Avenue in Portland.
Moby, trained to alert on the presence of explosives or gun odors, keyed in on a large hole in the ground near a shed. Agents then spotted a muddy gun case at the edge of the hole.
Though a stash of at least dozens of guns had been buried there, most had been moved by the time Moby found traces of them in the hole, according to court records.
Agents did find two stolen rifles wrapped in brown fabric in the shed, a stolen Sig Sauer handgun in Tamayo’s bedroom and multiple boxes of ammunition throughout the home, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicole Bockelman.
Tamayo admitted that Alexander Barber, who was tied to the theft of the trailer from a hotel parking lot on Hayden Island, had brought the guns to his home the night of the theft.
Tamayo was aware they were stolen as some of the guns still had price tags on them, according to court records.
“He assisted in hiding and concealing firearms that were stolen,” by digging a “very large hole in his backyard,” Bockelman said.
But Tamayo said Barber later became concerned that police were actively searching for the stolen guns and would discover them, so Tamayo helped Barber dig them up, according to court documents.
He told investigators that Barber moved most of them out and took them to someone that Tamayo knew only as a “homeless guy” named Brian, according to Bockelman. Tamayo kept two of the rifles.
Tamayo, 43, was sentenced after pleading guilty to possessing stolen guns.
“Defendant was an integral part of a chain of theft, possession and concealment of illegal firearms, resulting in financial loss to the victim,” Bockelman said.
After a search warrant at Tamayo’s home on June 8, 2022, federal investigators recovered the two stolen rifles and Sig Sauer from the home and five more stolen guns from other locations based on information obtained during the search warrant, according to the prosecutor.
Investigators have since recovered a total of 19 of the 35 stolen guns, according to Bockelman.
At least $40,000 worth of guns, including shotguns, pistols, AR-15 rifles and hunting rifles, and ammunition were part of a display for a Shooting Sports & Blade Expo at Portland’s Expo Center and were locked in a trailer attached to a white Ford F-250 truck.
The owner and her two sons watched a woman steal their truck and trailer parked in the lot of the Oxford Suites on North Jantzen Drive as they were packing up their belongings in a room overlooking the lot on May 9, 2022.
Bockelman agreed to the time-served sentence for Tamayo, noting he wasn’t involved in the initial theft, has a minimal criminal history and cooperated with police once they came to serve the search warrant.
Defense lawyer Edie M. Rogoway said the case changed her client’s life for the better. His treatment on pretrial release has helped him overcome a severe opioid and fentanyl addiction, Rogoway said.
Tamayo told U.S. District Judge Karin J. Immergut that he’s “truly happy” that he was charged in the case, calling it a “blessing in disguise,” though he’s now a convicted felon.
“It gave me my life back,” he said.
He now lives with family in California, holds a steady job, works out at a gym daily after work and attends addiction-related support meetings.
He will remain on three years of post-prison supervision and must participate in ongoing drug and alcohol treatment.
Angelina Pintor-Schindler, the woman who helped steal the trailer and then led police on a wild chase, also was sentenced to the time she’s already served, just over a year in custody. She was 21 at sentencing but 19 at the time of her arrest on May 10, 2022.
Barber, 31, her accomplice who brought the stolen guns to Tamayo’s home, is scheduled to be sentenced next month. The prosecutor and his defense lawyer are expected to jointly recommend a sentence of five years and three months for Barber, who remains in custody, according to court records. He pleaded guilty in April to being a felon in possession of at least 30 stolen guns.
He was arrested in Gresham days after the theft, found hiding in the attic of a home belonging to Pintor-Schindler’s mother, according to prosecutors.
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