Waterville woman pleads guilty to federal firearms charges

A Waterville woman has pleaded guilty to a federal charge for paying another person to buy a gun for her from a Fairfield gun dealer, according to prosecutors and court records.

Nikeshia Knight, 25, entered the plea Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Bangor on a charge of aiding another person in making false statements when purchasing a firearm, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maine wrote in a statement to the news media.

Knight faces a maximum of five years in federal prison and a fine of up to $250,000, followed by up to three years of supervised release.

She will be sentenced by a federal judge after a review by the U.S. Probation Office.

Knight’s court-appointed attorney, Daniel Dubé, who has a law practice in Lewiston, wrote in an email Thursday that federal firearms offenses are serious but that Knight’s actions were based on “tThe lower end of the severity spectrum.”

“MS. Knight accepted full responsibility for her behavior – unequivocally,” Dubé wrote of the guilty plea. “We have an excellent federal bench here in Maine. I have every confidence that the court will impose a sentence that is fair and equitable to Ms. Knight is for society.”

Dubé also wrote in the email, “Despite all the setbacks, Ms. Knight is an admirably strong person, especially at the age of twenty-five.”

The investigation into Knight’s crime began after a July 2022 arrest in Salem, Massachusetts, prosecutors wrote in court documents.

Investigators with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives determined that a person – identified in court records as “Person 1” – purchased the gun at A&G Shooting at 214 Center Road in Fairfield, prosecutors said.

The dealer provided documentation for that individual’s purchase of the firearm in June, as well as documentation for another firearm the individual purchased that month.

Investigators determined that Knight was involved in the purchase of the other firearm, a Century Cugir Micro Draco 7.62x39mm pistol, and interviewed Knight in June 2023.

“During these recorded interviews, which were Mirandized, the defendant admitted that she let Individual 1 purchase a firearm,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew McCormack wrote in a summary of the prosecution’s evidence. “The defendant said she could not purchase the firearm herself because she was ‘in the middle of processing a case’ and had not successfully passed a background check.”

According to prosecutors, Knight provided the buyer with an undisclosed amount of money and fentanyl. Using a proxy buyer is often referred to as a “straw purchase.”

Phone records and text messages also confirmed that Knight directed the purchase, according to prosecutors’ court documents.

Knight, who was charged June 12, was arrested by federal agents on Sept. 26, according to court records.

At Knight’s initial court appearance and arraignment on the day of her arrest, she was in state custody, according to court records. Knight agreed to be incarcerated once he was released from state custody.

A sentencing hearing had not been scheduled as of Thursday morning.