Summary: Attorney Maurice Harmon was preparing to board an international flight with a loaded semiautomatic handgun when he was arrested by officials.
A Pennsylvania lawyer was caught trying to board a Cuba-bound airplane with a loaded gun. Port Authority officials arrested Maurice Harmon, of Lehigh Township, after the scan of his carry-on bag indicated a 9-mm. Glock 19 was inside. The 63-year-old North Hampton attorney entered an X-ray machine at Newark Airport in Terminal C and was then placed under arrest.
Not only was Harmon trying to bring a loaded gun onto the plane, the gun was loaded with an illegal extra-capacity clip holding a total of 18 bullets, including one in the chamber. He was charged with illegal weapons possession and unlawful possession of a high capacity clip. He is being held at the Essex County jail.
Harmon was trying to fly to Havana. His firm website explains that he started out in Colorado as a prosecutor before turning to photography. He claims to have captured shots for magazines such as Sport Illustrated, Golfweek, Holiday, and Golf & Travel as well as commercials for K-Mart, Penguin Books, Rolex and Ernst & Young. He went back to practicing law in 2003 to specialize in copyright infringement.
Some of his legal work includes a lawsuit in 2007 where he used Random House on behalf of Neal Biedleman regarding Jon Krakauer’s version of their Mt. Everest ordeal in 1996 that left eight dead in the best-seller “Into Thin Air.” Biedleman, a survivor of the ordeal, claimed that Random House did not fully compensate him for using his photographs in the book. Their case won.
Harmon received his law degree in 1978 from the University of Detroit Law School. He was employed by the District Attorney’s Office in Grand Junction for a time before starting his own firm. He handled civil and criminal trial cases for eight years before deciding in 1988 to pursue photography in New York. In 2006, he collaborated with Chris Seidman to form the firm Harmon & Seidman. He keeps an office in Pennsylvania and his admitted to practice in U.S. courts in Boston, Chattanooga, Chicago, Detroit, New York City, Philadelphia, and Phoenix. He is still a member of the Colorado bar.
Would you ever forget that you had a loaded gun packed in your carry-on bag? Tell us in the comments below.
To learn more about attorneys with gun charges against them, read these articles:
- Defense Attorney Arrested For Taking Guns, Drugs As Payment
- Florida Attorney Caught Bringing Loaded Gun to Courthouse
- Over 50 Guns Seized from Attorney’s Home
Photo: mcall.com