DETROIT, – A fight in a parking lot turned into more than 16 years in prison for a Michigan man who hid a gun in an infant’s room.
Cartez Howard, 38, of Detroit, was convicted by a jury of two counts of possession of firearms as a felon in December 2025.
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On Tuesday, May 26, 2026, a judge sentenced Howard to 200 months in federal prison -- that translates to 16 years and eight months.
According to court records, in September 2025, Howard, a convicted felon with a violent criminal history, was on federal supervised release and got into an argument over a parking spot outside a business.
Police said the argument ended when Howard pulled an AR-style rifle from his car, pointed it at a man, and fired a shot at his feet.
Howard then tried to grab the man’s glasses before driving away.
The man followed Howard to report him.
Howard drove into a residential neighborhood and fired around 30 shots, police say.
Eleven days later, Howard drove the same car to a gas station with the same rifle in the backseat and abandoned the car when police located it.
After Howard was arrested, agents searched Howard’s apartment, where they found a second gun hidden in his bedroom closet.
The authorities say the gun was tucked under a baby blanket in the room he shared with his infant child and the child’s mother.