An ex-con who served seven years in state prison for manslaughter has been busted for making ghost guns in the Queens home he shares with his wife and mother, police said Wednesday.
Glen Martinez, 53, was sound asleep when police early Monday morning broke down the door to his College Point apartment on Riviera Court near 121st St., police said.
Martinez, clad only in his boxers, was arrested and hit with numerous gun possession charges.
“I thought I had the right to bear arms,” Martinez said, according to the court criminal complaint.
Recovered inside the apartment were a Glock-style semi-automatic pistol, two silencers, three ammunition feeding devices, two lower receivers — the part of the gun that holds the other components — ammunition, two 3D printers and 59 spools of thermoplastic polymer filament used to print the weapons, according to the complaint.
Martinez’s wife and mother were not charged and appeared surprised to learn what he was doing when he was alone in his bedroom, a police source said.
It appears Martinez was not selling ghost guns but is “some sort of 3D printer hobbyist” — though a book detailing how to use the printers to make money was found in his apartment, the source said.
“And with his past you never know,” the source added.
Martinez was busted for murder in 1996 after Geraldo Albertorio, 20, was shot dead on the Lower East Side. The Daily News at the time reported the victim managed to identify his killer, telling police Martinez was angry that Martinez’s sister had been arrested for drugs, with Albertorio failing to step up and claim the drugs belonged to him.
Martinez pleaded guilty to manslaughter in May 1997, was sentenced to up to 12 years in state prison and released by parole in June 2004, a police source said.
Martinez was arrested seven times after his release, including once for burglary and once for driving without a license. The other cases are sealed.
His eighth arrest, for the ghost guns, was sparked when police learned he was receiving parts and equipment at his apartment typically used to make ghost guns, though Martinez tried to avoid detection by using in his mailing address the name Ken Martin, the source said. He had used that name when he worked as a photographer, the source said.
Martinez pleaded not guilty at his arraignment in Queens Criminal Court and is being held on $50,000 bail.
A spokesman for Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz said Queens accounts for 38% of the ghost guns seized in the city since 2021.
Last year, the spokesman said, 162 ghost guns were recovered in Queens, followed by 92 in the Bronx, 79 in Brooklyn, 35 in Manhattan and 16 on Staten Island.