Foreign student caught possessing assault weapons illegally

Jun 13, 2007

Police say 20-year-old Kidus Chane Yohannes, a visiting immigrant student from Ethiopia, was arrested Friday morning, June 8th, at the home where he has been living at 1428 South 680 East.
According to authorities, Yohannes was arrested for falsifying information on the background form for purchasing an assault weapon in March 2007.
Orem police received information from Yohannes roommates on June 7th that Yohannes exhibited concerning behavior and had said things that led his roommates to believe that Yohannes was potentially a danger to others.
According to Orem Police Lt. Doug Edwards, Yohannes had recently lost his job and reportedly spent his free time looking at videos and Internet sites about killing other human beings. Edwards said Yohannes often spoke of killing and made comments that he would like kill the police.
Edwards says roommates brought police AK-47 ammunition and clips and expressed concern for their safety and the safety of others, saying that they didn't want a "Trolley Square" or "Virginia Tech"-type shooting to occur. Police say the roommates reported that Yohannes had recently started parking his car several blocks away from the home and moving it each night, and that they believed he might be hiding something in his car.
Edwards says that although nothing that had been reported regarding Yohannes constituted a crime, they were alarmed enough about what was reported and refused to sit on the information and see if Yohannes was going to make good on his threats.
According to Edwards, the report filed by the roommates on June 7th was assigned to a detective to see if there was anything that could be done to head off a potential threat to the community. The detective contacted ICE authorities to determine Yohannes' country of original and legal status in the United States, according to Edwards.
Edwards added that an ICE agent told Orem Police that a Provo police officer had just made the same inquiry regarding Yohannes. The Orem investigating detective contacted Provo Police and found that an officer had been working on information concerning Yohannes after an arrest made in Provo in March 2007 where an assault rifle had been confiscated from Yohannes, according to Edwards.
Edwards further added the the Provo investigating officer had discovered that Yohannes purchased three assault-type rifles from VanWagenen Finance in Orem since October 2006, and that the Provo detective had obtained copies of the applications to purchase the rifles and noted that different resident alien numbers were used on the applications.
Edwards says that the Provo detective brought that information with him to meet with Orem Detectives and the Orem City Attorney was consulted. It was determined that the use of different resident alien numbers on the applications were grounds for felony charges and an arrest was obtained.
Officers from Orem, Provo, and agents from Immigrations & Customs Enforcement served the warrant on Friday morning as Yohannes slept at his home, according to Edwards.
Search warrants were issued to search Yohannes' belongings and his car that was located some three blocks from his home, according to police.
Officers say they recovered two guns from the car, neither of which were the two SKS assault rifles they had hoped to find.
Edwards says those assault weapons are still unaccounted for, though police can prove that they were purchased by Yohannes. Yohannes has made no comment on the whereabouts of the missing assault rifles, according to Edwards.
Kidus Chane Yohannes remains in custody at the Utah County jail on $250,000 bail.

ABC4.com