US Military Guns In Unlocked Case Fedexed To Bombardier Facility In Canada

Two military-grade assault rifles and two handguns used by the U.S. Military arrived via FedEx in an unlocked case at a Bombardier’s facility in Toronto last week, a report said.

Bombardier is a multinational aerospace and transportation company which has two facilities in the city — a regional support office and an engineering manufacturing site — according to the company’s website.

Canada-based CTV News, which reported the incident, obtained photos that showed weapons inside the unlocked case marked as property of the United States government.

According to CTV News Public Safety Analyst Chris Lewis, it was unclear how the weapons passed through the security check in the border.

“So there’s a total failure of some sort – (it’s) totally illegal to ship them that way,” he said. “There’s no way on God’s great earth that anybody should be shipping firearms – handguns or assault rifles – unless they’re coming through some due process within Canada Border Service Agency’s framework.”

The alarming shipment, which contained two Beretta handguns and two M4 assault rifles, arrived at the shipping department of the company’s Downsview facility in Toronto, just north of Highway 401, on Aug. 30.

Lewis said the M4, a shorter and lighter variant of the M16A2 assault rifle, can easily out-power the semiautomatic weapons used by Canadian police officers.

“That firepower is very similar to what we saw used in Vegas, where someone killed a pile of people,” he said. “Nobody can own them in Canada unless they were owned prior to them becoming prohibited weapons.”

The case contained only a little paperwork, which informed security about the contents it carried inside. A receipt attached to the case showed there were two packets in the shipment. Only one arrived at the Toronto facility. The contents of the second case and the place where it might have been delivered to remained unclear from the paperwork, the report said.

The tracking number on the package showed the guns were sent Aug. 29 from Spanish Fork in Utah. The package reached Memphis, Tennessee, sometime after midnight the next day. It was processed in Mississauga, Ontario, at 7.55 a.m. EDT on Aug. 30.

Bombardier confirmed the delivery of the parcel at 11.34 a.m. on the same day in a statement.

"Bombardier confirms that a package was delivered in error to its facility in Downsview," the company told CTV News. “Bombardier's security personnel notified the police as soon as the discovery was made, and the misdirected package was immediately removed from the site.”

The Toronto Police confirmed the package containing the weapons were turned over to them. An investigation into the incident was ongoing, the police added.

The Canada Border Services Agency told CTV News it was looking into the incident. The agency added more information might be available by the end of the week.

FedEx told CTV News the company was conducting its own “thorough investigation” into the matter while co-operating with the authorities.