Appeal court upholds sentence in Pa. straw gun purchase

An appeals court has upheld the sentence of nearly six to 12 years for a southeastern Pennsylvania woman in the first use of a new law aimed at cracking down on people who illegally buy guns for others.

PennLive.com reported that a Superior Court panel recently denied 24-year-old Staci Dawson’s appeal of the 71 1/2- to 143-month term imposed a year ago by a Delaware County judge.

Dawson was convicted of buying two guns for her boyfriend, a felon later slain. Prosecutors said she was the first person to receive a five-year mandatory minimum under the law enacted last year after Brad Fox, a Plymouth Township officer, was shot and killed in the line of duty by a man using a gun bought by someone else.