West Sacramento Man Sentenced to Over 4 Years for Felon in Possession of Firearm

Richard Lee Dazo, 40, was sentenced to four years and three months in prison for being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition.

By AI ReporterWritten Aug 28, 2026, 6:11 p.m. ET

Developing · not yet checked for updates

This case is not concluded. The Justice Department announces the cases it brings and the ones it wins; it does not issue a release when a jury acquits or a judge dismisses. A charge reported here may since have been resolved in the defendant's favour without any further announcement.

We have not yet searched for new coverage of this beyond the reports listed below.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Richard Lee Dazo, 40, of West Sacramento, was Thursday by U.S. District Judge Daniel J. Calabretta to four years and three months in prison for being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition, U.S. Attorney Eric Grant announced. According to court documents, on Aug. 13, 2024, law enforcement officers conducted a probation search of Dazo and his motel room. A firearm was in plain view on the bed. Although Dazo claimed it was fake, it was identified as a CO2-powered pellet gun designed to resemble a .357 magnum revolver and loaded with four .357 rounds of magnum ammunition and two rounds of .38 special ammunition. Nearby was a knife handle with metal knuckles and an automatic-release blade. A purse-style bag in the room contained separate baggies of methamphetamine, fentanyl, and heroin. Under the bed, officers found a loaded Remington 870 12-gauge shotgun with a 16-inch barrel, along with additional shotgun shells. Dazo is prohibited from possessing firearms and ammunition due to prior felony convictions. This is his third conviction for being a felon with a firearm. Dazo pleaded guilty on Dec. 4, 2025. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the West Sacramento Police Department’s Special Investigations Unit conducted the investigation. Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew De Moura and Assistant U.S. Attorney Caily Nelson prosecuted the case.

Was this report accurate and useful?

Sources

Revision history

Version 128 Aug 2026, 22:11current
First published.

How we work

This site models an investigative reporter rather than a wire desk. The aim is the most complete, accurate and timely account we can assemble — all three, not a trade between them. Reports go out within minutes of the coverage they are built from, carrying context a newsroom would otherwise need a day and a records request to gather: what has happened at this place before, what the operator’s record is, which aircraft it actually was.

Reports are built from primary sources — accident and court records, official registries, weather observations, agency statements — and from reputable news organisations, each named where their reporting is used. Facts are extracted before anything is written, and every one must be supported by a quotation found in the source itself; the model that writes the report is given only those verified facts and never sees the article, so it cannot introduce a detail no source stated.

Where sources disagree we publish the disagreement, attributed, rather than picking a figure. Where a fact comes from a record rather than a reporter, we say so, and the language matches: an instrument reading is never described as something anyone confirmed. Some things are deliberately withheld — a suspect is not named until an agency names them on the record, victims until families or officials release them — and corrections appear as visible revisions, never as silent edits.

None of that makes a report true. A quotation check proves a source said something, not that it was right, and an automated system can be confidently wrong in ways the checks do not catch. If something here is wrong, the feedback above is how it gets found. The full methodology, including what we refuse to publish.