Three Men Face Charges of Manufacturing and Trafficking Ghost Guns

Tony Ho shooting a firearm with a silencer

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Three Men Face Charges of Manufacturing and Trafficking Ghost Guns

Posted to Politics August 30, 2023 by DVJ Editor

From a press release

Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin R. Steele, Homeland Security Investigations (Philadelphia) Special Agent in Charge William S. Walker and Hatfield Township Police Chief William Tierney announce the arrest of Tony Phan Ho, 32, and Rithga Ngoy, 36, both of Hatfield; and Michael Phan Nguyen, 32, of Lansdale, on gun trafficking charges related to manufacturing ghost guns and suppressors (silencers) as well as illegal sales of those items.

The investigation into this gun trafficking organization began in May 2023, when a shipment of firearm suppressor component parts from China was intercepted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection at JFK International Airport in New York. The shipment of suppressor parts was being shipped to defendant Ho at his home address in Hatfield. Ho is legally precluded from possessing a firearm, which includes suppressors/silencers.

Homeland Security Investigations contacted the Montgomery County Detective Bureau and Hatfield Police in early July 2023, and together detectives and an HSI agent spoke with Ho at his residence, then obtained a search warrant for his residence and a shed workshop where Ho was manufacturing firearms.

Tony Ho

Searching of Ho’s property, detectives allegedly found all of the tools needed to privately manufacture firearms, numerous AR-15 rifle parts, firearm sights, firearm sight tools, a Polymer80 tool kit, weapon mounted lights, a Glock pistol barrel, a Sig Sauer 320P modular grip frame, assorted other firearms parts, a 3D printer and ammunition, officials said.

The investigators also found numerous photos of completed firearms and partially made firearms in Ho’s cellphone as well as several videos of firearms, including one that showed Ho lying in his backdoor frame firing an AR-15-style rifle with a silencer attached out into his residence’s backyard.

Michael Nyugen

Also found within the cellphone were communications between the three defendants and others unnamed regarding the availability and sales of the firearms made by Ho and the attempted illegal purchase of a firearm from a gun store by Nguyen. The captured communications identified 15 illegal firearm sales dating back to March 2020.

Ahead of the interview with law enforcement and search of Ho’s residence, Ho asked his co-conspirator Ngoy to take his firearms so the firearms would not be in Ho’s residence. Ngoy later turned in to Hatfield Police the multiple firearms parts and the 15 functioning firearms that he was holding for Ho—14 of which were ghosts guns or privately-made completed firearms.

“The items found at Ho’s residence, the photos of numerous privately made firearms taken at his residence and the quantity of firearms parts that Ho bought online clearly show that he was manufacturing a significant number of privately made firearms and silencers on site,” said DA Kevin Steele. “The true extent of his firearms manufacturing business—as well as the extent of the criminal activities those firearms were then used in—may never be known, especially since privately made firearms have no serial numbers. These ghost guns are a great danger to the safety of our communities.”

Rithga Ngoy

Ho is charged with corrupt organization, conspiracy, person not to possess a firearm, illegal firearms sales, dealing in the proceeds of unlawful activities, materially false statements, statement under penalty, criminal use of a communications facility, make/repair/sell offensive weapons and other firearms charges.

Ngoy is charged with corrupt organization, conspiracy, illegal firearms sales, dealing in the proceeds of unlawful activities, and criminal use of a communications facility and other firearms charges.

Nguyen is charged with corrupt organization, conspiracy, illegal firearms sales, dealing in the proceeds of unlawful activities, and criminal use of a communications facility and other firearms charges.

Ho and Ngoy were arrested and arraigned Aug. 28, 2023, before Magisterial District Judge Michael P. Quinn, who set bail at $250,000 cash for each defendant. Nguyen turned himself in to police and was arraigned Aug. 28, 2023, before Quinn, who set bail at $75,000 10 percent. During a bail review hearing on Aug. 28, 2021, Court of Common Pleas Judge William R. Carpenter did not change the defendants’ bail amounts. As a condition of bail, each defendant also had to surrender his passport and may not possess a firearm. The defendants were unable to make bail and were remanded to the Montgomery County Correctional Facility.

A preliminary hearing for all three defendants is scheduled for 9 a.m., Sept. 13, 2023, before Magisterial District Judge Edward Levine. The case will be prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Samantha Arena.