A Staten Island NYPD detective previously accused of assembling an arsenal of illegal, 3D-printed “ghost guns” was arrested again on weapons charges, cops said Friday.
Anthony Sciortino, 36, was arrested Thursday around 8:20 a.m. on Staten Island’s North Shore and charged with attempted criminal purchase or disposal of a weapon, police said.
Sciortino was previously arrested last November when a raid of his Princes Bay home turned up 19 illegal, unregistered firearms, including four untraceable ghost guns lacking serial numbers, according to court records. He was charged with manufacturing a machine gun and manufacturing a rapid-fire modification device, among other charges, in a 17-count indictment.
In addition to the weapons raps, prosecutors alleged he falsified police reports and accessed NYPD records for “nefarious” reasons, the Daily News reported in 2024.
Sciortino allegedly “deceitfully amassed a small army’s worth of unregistered weapons, in addition to personally manufacturing multiple unlicensed, unregistered and untraceable ghost guns and assault weapons,” Staten Island District Attorney Michael McMahon said in a statement at the time.
Ghost guns, McMahon said, are “incredibly difficult to track by law enforcement,” and by producing them and failing to register the other weapons, Sciortino “could have exacted untold amounts of harm.”
Furthermore, the D.A. said, “Sciortino used and abused the public trust and betrayed his sworn oath to protect and serve by falsifying line-of-duty incident reports and using his position as an NYPD detective to access personnel records for unauthorized, unofficial and nefarious purposes. Simply put, this brazen act of misconduct undermines the noble mission of law enforcement, weakens the public’s trust in the criminal justice system, and makes those we are sworn to protect and serve less safe.”
Sciortino was granted supervised release at his arraignment on the earlier charges. That case is still making its way through the courts, according to public records. Sciortino has been suspended without pay since his arrest in 2024, a police spokesperson said.
An NYPD member since 2011, Sciortino has a checkered history with the department, including three substantiated civilian complaints for pointing a gun, plus improperly entering and searching a premises back in October 2021. He was docked 10 vacation days for each complaint, public records show.
He has been a defendant in at least seven lawsuits against the NYPD since 2012, including cases involving allegations of false arrest and a warrantless raid on a Brooklyn home.
The most recent arrest appears to stem from an incident in 2021, records show. Sciortino pleaded not guilty at his arraignment Thursday and was released on his own recognizance, SIAdvance reported.
His next court date is Nov. 25.