
NEW HAVEN — A 26-year-old Ansonia man will spend a year in federal prison for posting a video on his Facebook page showing him holding a handgun.
Jalil Humphrey’s arrest record shows two prior felony convictions for sale of a controlled substance and second-degree assault, according to court documents. That meant his gun video constituted a federal offense, the government said, because convicted felons and guns don’t mix.
Authorities were not randomly watching Humphrey’s Facebook page.
Agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) began looking at him in 2017 as a suspect in a stolen firearm case out of Stratford. He was never charged.
But an ATF agent, acting on a tip, checked out Humphrey’s Facebook page and saw the video.
After identifying Humphrey as the person in the video, the agent was able to use markings from the gun to determine it had been purchased at a gun shop in North Carolina by one of Humphrey’s friends from Ansonia.
According to prosecutors, Humphrey was arrested after law enforcement secured a warrant, and he admitted to holding the gun in the video.
“Holding a firearm and taking a video of himself doing so when there was no reason for him to have had a firearm is illegal and dangerous behavior,” the government said in a sentencing memo.
Humphrey waived indictment and took plea agreement offered by prosecutors. He pleaded guilty to possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.
In a sentencing memo, Humphrey’s lawyer pointed out that Humphrey had a tough childhood and suffers from depression and post traumatic stress disorder.
He is responding well to treatment for those issues and accepts responsibility for his actions, his lawyer noted. The prior criminal convictions may have been when he was 19, the sentencing memo indicates.
A social worker wrote to the court on Humphrey’s behalf, saying he seemed to have turned a corner and was actively trying to improve himself and the situation.
Humphrey will be on three years of supervised release after he gets out of jail. He was sentenced Wednesday (Dec. 18).
The case was investigated by the ATF and New Haven Police Department. It was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jocelyn Courtney Kaoutzanis.
This prosecution is part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) program, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.