According to court documents unsealed Thursday, Matthew Opaliski, 40, of Greenwood was indicted by a federal grand jury last week on three counts of dealing firearms without a license and two counts of unlawful transfer of firearms.
Prosecutors allege the illegal activity took place on several different occasions between last November and earlier this month.
Opaliski, a tea party supporter and gun rights activist who has testified in the legislature on firearms bills, appeared in court Wednesday and was released on his own recognizance pending a Feb. 26 arraignment. […]
Opaliski, who chairs the Delaware Republican Party’s 35th Representative District Committee in Sussex County and has been a three-time candidate for state Senate, did not immediately respond to an email message Thursday. The voice mail system at his home was not accepting messages, and a cellphone number he has used in the past is no longer in service.
All the Sussex tea party officials now in control of the party appartus on the county and district level refused comment or did not return comment. But I personally loved the State GOP’s Executive Director John Fluharty’s comment
“Matt is part of the Sussex County Party structure and elected by folks in his local area,” said Delaware GOP executive director John Fluharty. “I’m sure the Sussex county executive committee will respond to this very difficult situation with the best interests of the party first and foremost.”
Translation: He’s not my guy, and he was elected by you teabagging dolts downstate, so he is your responsibility. But here is what is going to happen immediately: he is gone, and you guys are going to make him gone.
If these charges are true, and if Mr. Opaliski is convicted, then he is now the perfect symbol of the kind of criminal who get guns to people who do massive harm, such as murder and massacres. He would also be the kind of criminal who thinks he is supporting the Second Amendment when in fact he is directly harming it. Mr. Opaliski should stand trial, and if the facts are proven beyond a reasonable doubt, he should be convicted and he should serve time behind bars. Then these federal prosecutors need to check all the illegal weapons he sold, ever, because we know it is more than what is in the indictment. If any one of them were used in violent crimes, Mr. Opaliski should be charged with those crimes as well. In other words, throw the fucking book at him, and every single Second Amendment supporter in this small state and nationwide should agree, and they must agree.