Department of Justice

CHICAGO — A man has been sentenced to nearly four years in federal prison for illegally possessing a loaded handgun during an altercation on a Chicago street.

JULIAN ALMANZA, 22, of Chicago, illegally possessed the gun on the afternoon of Jan. 14, 2021, in Chicago’s Humboldt Park neighborhood. At one point during the altercation Almanza stood in the middle of a street and pointed the gun at multiple individuals. When Chicago Police officers began arriving on the scene, Almanza slid the firearm under a truck. The officers quickly discovered the gun, which was equipped with an extended magazine and loaded with 25 rounds of ammunition.

Almanza had previously been convicted of two firearm felonies in state court and was not legally allowed to possess the gun. He was on parole for the more recent firearm offense at the time of the federal charge.

Almanza pleaded guilty earlier this year to a federal charge of illegal possession of a firearm. U.S. District Judge John Z. Lee imposed a 44-month prison sentence Thursday after a hearing in federal court in Chicago.

The sentence was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; Kristen de Tineo, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Field Division of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; and David Brown, Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department. Valuable assistance was provided by the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office. Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick M. Mott represented the government.

Holding illegal firearm possessors accountable through federal prosecution is a centerpiece of Project Safe Neighborhoods, the Department of Justice’s violent crime reduction strategy. In the Northern District of Illinois, U.S. Attorney Lausch and law enforcement partners have deployed the PSN program to attack a broad range of violent crime issues facing the district, particularly firearm offenses.