Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives

Portland, Maine: United States Attorney Halsey B. Frank announced that Keon Shine, 28, of Boston, Massachusetts, was sentenced today in U.S. District Court by Judge D. Brock Hornby to 6½ years in prison and three years of supervised release for being a felon in possession of firearms.  Shine pled guilty on November 29, 2017.

According to court records, on April 8, 2017, Shine and co-defendant, Dane Mitchell, drove to a shooting range in Gray, Maine, where they rented firearms, purchased ammunition, and fired the weapons.  Boston Police Department officers identified Shine, Mitchell and the shooting range from videos that were uploaded to Snapchat.  Shine was prohibited from possessing firearms as a result of his 2011 Massachusetts felony convictions for receiving a stolen motor vehicle and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.

On May 14, 2018, Mitchell, who was also prohibited from possessing firearms, was sentenced to 27 months in prison and three years of supervised release.

The case was investigated jointly by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the Boston Police Department’s Youth Violence Strike Force and prosecuted as part of Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN), a program bringing together all levels of law enforcement and the communities they serve to reduce violent crime and make our neighborhoods safer for everyone. Attorney General Jeff Sessions reinvigorated PSN in 2017 as part of the Department’s renewed focus on targeting violent criminals, directing all U.S. Attorney’s Offices to work in partnership with federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement and the local community to develop effective, locally-based strategies to reduce violent crime.

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