First Slice 12-23-14: Feds charge Delta employees involved in gun-smuggling operation

• LASSE FUSS/WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Federal authorities have charged Delta Air Lines employee Mark Henry for his role in smuggling 18 guns on an airplane headed to New York. The weapons were among the at least 129 handguns and two assault rifles he allegedly taken aboard planes since last May. Henry received help from Delta baggage handler Eugene Harvey, who used his security access to carry weapons through checkpoints.

Ismaaiyl Brinsley, the man accused of killing two New York police officers, used a semiautomatic weapon in the shooting that was originally purchased at a metro Atlanta pawn shop in 1996. Since Brinsley was a convicted felon, experts say he might have obtained the gun through a loophole in the state’s law.

The zoning lawyer who helped get a controversial mosque proposal approved in Kennesaw, but only after threatening a lawsuit, talks about his First Amendment fight. “Everybody’s all about the Muslims these days, but it’s really about the opportunity to worship as you please in free and peaceful assembly,” Doug Dillard tells the Daily Report.

R.I.P., employee voice mailboxes at Coca-Cola’s headquarters.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Atlanta has the highest percentage of cheap homes that likely remain underwater.

Club Onyx’s DJ Awesome continued to spin records as he heard about his wife’s murder on the night of Nov. 23, according to one police officer. The DJ, born Andre Jason Pugh, faces multiple charges including murder, conspiracy to commit murder and conspiracy to commit burglary.

“To challenge the police is to challenge the American people, and the problem with the police is not that they are fascist pigs but that we are majoritarian pigs.”