Updated: 4:50 PM CST Dec 18, 2020
KOCO Staff
McLoud resident Christopher Steven Ledbetter has been sentenced to nearly five years in federal prison for illegally possessing a fully automatic machine gun, prosecutors announced Friday.Ledbetter, 29, was sentenced to 57 months, according to a news release from the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Oklahoma. In March, according to the release, the FBI learned that Ledbetter might have had the machine gun. Agents reviewed “publicly available materials on the internet” that showed Ledbetter shooting what appeared to be a fully automatic weapon and threatening law enforcement.On June 4, the FBI encountered Ledbetter in Oklahoma City, according to the release. In his vehicle, they discovered a fully automatic “AK-47 style carbine machinegun.” Agents searched his home in McLoud and found two homemade grenades, two homemade Molotov cocktails, as well as stolen firearms. Ledbetter was arrested and confessed, according to the release. Fully automatics are illegal except under limited circumstances. Ledbetter didn’t have a license to possess the weapon, according to the release. U.S. District Judge Charles B. Goodwin on Thursday sentenced Ledbetter to prison time, followed by three years of supervised release. “The successful prosecution of this case demonstrates that those who put our communities at risk, especially through the unlawful possession of firearms, will be held accountable,” U.S. Attorney Tim Downing of the Northern District said in the release.