W. Phila. imam gets 8 years for selling guns to informant
By MICHAEL HINKELMAN
hinkelm@phillynews.com 215-854-2656

A West Philadelphia imam was sentenced yesterday to eight years and four months in a federal slammer for selling handguns and assault rifles without a license to an FBI informant who he thought was a drug dealer.

U.S. District Judge Timothy J. Savage ordered Wayne Hogue, 48, also known as "Imam Wadir," to surrender to the Bureau of Prisons on April 30.

Hogue is an imam of the 52nd Street Mosque in West Philadelphia, prosecutors said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas Zaleski said the government was satisfied with the sentence, which was within the sentencing-guideline range of 97 to 121 months.

Hogue's attorney, Paul J. Hetznecker, said he respected Savage's decision. "I was hoping for a shorter period of incarceration, but the judge recognized that there were some significant mitigating factors."

Pleading his case before Savage, Hogue ranted against federal investigators, who he said had engaged in "unethical behavior."

"I was hoodwinked, bamboozled and led amok," Hogue said, referring to the informant, who he said had "seduced" him.

Although Hogue confessed to being greedy, Savage was unimpressed. He said Hogue seemed more disappointed that he had allowed himself to be "taken in" by the informant than that he had been caught committing crimes.

Court papers said Hogue became friendly with the informant - who sometimes attended Hogue's mosque - and after a period of months Hogue broached the topic of selling guns to the informant.

The feds gave the informant $40,000 to pay for his services, including the purchase of the weapons from Hogue and help in another investigation.

The gun transactions occurred between May 2003 and March 2004.

Most of the gun sales occurred at a clothing stand Hogue operated at 52nd and Chestnut streets. One of the transactions - involving a handgun loaded with six live rounds of ammo - took place inside Hogue's office at the mosque, prosecutors said.

Hogue was convicted last September after a four-day trial for dealing in firearms without a license and being a felon in possession of a firearm.

Between May 2003 and March 2004, Hogue sold the informant two assault rifles, both loaded with live rounds of ammo; a rifle with a sawed-off barrel and an obliterated serial number; a 12-gauge shotgun; and six handguns, three of which had obliterated serial numbers and two of which contained live ammo.

Hogue was convicted of simple assault in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court in 1998 and of theft in 2003.

He was on probation on the theft conviction at the time he was selling firearms to the FBI informant, something Savage took note of yesterday before sentencing Hogue.

"I can't overlook the fact you were on probation at the time these crimes were committed," the judge said. "You had full knowledge you were under the supervision of the courts and yet you were still doing this."