Max Chambers, Machine Gun Possession, Florida 2019

Max Chambers, a 21-year-old former University of Central Florida student from Sarasota, has pleaded guilty to possession of a machine gun — a crime that carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison. The charge stems from a January 2019 tip that sent law enforcement crashing into his campus dorm and car, where they found deadly, illegal modifications hidden in plain sight.

According to court documents, on January 28, 2019, the University of Central Florida Police Department received an anonymous alert claiming Chambers was in possession of three drop-in auto-sears (DIAS) — a device engineered to convert semi-automatic rifles into fully automatic killing machines. Officers moved fast. Inside his dorm room, they seized a completed DIAS. In his vehicle, parked on UCF property, they found a second DIAS and an AR-15-style rifle already modified to fire in full auto mode — a transformation Chambers later admitted to making himself.

Chambers didn’t deny his handiwork. During interviews with federal agents, he confessed to building the DIAS units and altering the AR-15 with the explicit goal of making it fire like a machine gun. That admission sealed his fate. Possession of a firearm capable of fully automatic fire is a serious federal offense — no questions asked, no excuses accepted.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and the University of Central Florida Police Department led the investigation, a textbook example of campus cops and federal agents working in lockstep to stop a potential disaster before it erupts. The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Amanda Daniels, who made no concessions in securing the guilty plea.

This conviction is the latest under the Department of Justice’s “Project Safe Neighborhoods” (PSN) initiative, a nationwide push to crush violent crime through aggressive prosecution, community outreach, and strategic law enforcement coordination. In Florida’s Middle District, U.S. Attorney Maria Chapa Lopez oversees the program, partnering with federal, state, and local agencies to identify and neutralize threats before they turn deadly.

No sentencing date has been set. But one thing is clear: Max Chambers thought he could build a machine gun in his dorm and get away with it. He was wrong. Now, he faces a decade behind bars — a price for playing with fire on a college campus where students go to learn, not to dodge bullets.

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