ATLANTA — A Mexican national faces a federal firearms charge after a gun he allegedly carried onto a MARTA bus discharged, wounding him and another passenger, federal prosecutors said.
Guillermo Cruz Velazquez, 53, was traveling on a MARTA bus in Sandy Springs on July 22 when a firearm inside his bag allegedly fired one round, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia.
The bullet passed through Cruz Velazquez’s arm and struck a female passenger, prosecutors said.
After the bus stopped, Cruz Velazquez allegedly fled on foot. Sandy Springs police officers followed a trail of blood to a nearby parking lot, where they found him with a gunshot wound to his forearm and a bag with a hole in it.
Officers recovered a loaded .45-caliber handgun from nearby bushes. A spent cartridge case was lodged in the weapon’s ejection port, according to prosecutors.
Cruz Velazquez was charged by criminal complaint with unlawful possession of a firearm by a person illegally or unlawfully present in the United States. Federal prosecutors said he is from Iztapalapa, Mexico.
He appeared in federal court and was ordered held in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service pending further proceedings.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, MARTA Police Department and Sandy Springs Police Department are investigating the case, with assistance from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
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