Man sentenced to 15 years for selling gun to undercover cop used in fatal shooting

A man has been sentenced to 15 years in federal prison for selling an undercover Chicago police officer a gun he had used to fatally shoot a man in Greater Grand Crossing, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois.

Levion Thomas was sentenced last Thursday by U.S. District Judge Thomas M. Durkin after pleading guilty to a federal illegal firearm possession charge in 2024, according to the federal office.

The gun Thomas possessed had been tied to the murder of Troy Pouncey, 31, who was shot in his face and body around 1:15 p.m. in the 7100 block of South Calumet Avenue March 5, 2023, according to Chicago police. He was taken to University of Chicago Medical Center where he later died.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, along with Chicago police, arranged for a purchase of the weapon by an undercover officer after finding Thomas had been looking to sell the weapon, prosecutors said in court documents.

Thomas sold the gun, which he used to kill Pouncey, to an undercover Chicago police officer in the front seat of a car in Burnham, Illinois, 15 days after the shooting.

Thomas initially got into the vehicle wearing a mask before removing it, which revealed his face to the cameras inside the car. He then took $500 in exchange for the handgun, per court documents. Thomas had previously pleaded guilty to a charge of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon in 2021, for which he was sentenced to a year in prison.

“Too many people in this city believe that they can unlawfully possess firearms with impunity,” Assistant U.S. Attorneys Julia Schwartz and Jessica Ecker wrote in court documents. “This needs to stop.”