BOSTON — A Boston man has been sentenced to eight months in federal prison in connection with a shipment of guns and ammunition found hidden inside an air conditioner at a port in the Dominican Republic, federal prosecutors said Monday.

Alexis Lara Herrera, 28, pleaded guilty in May to failure to file export information, according to the U.S. attorney's office in Massachusetts. Senior U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV also ordered two years of supervised release after the prison term.

Prosecutors said that on or about March 18, 2023, authorities inspecting international freight at the Port of Haina in the Dominican Republic searched a shipping container from Brooklyn, New York, whose manifest said it held household goods. Inside an air conditioner, they found four Glock guns and 500 rounds of ammunition. Investigators later determined that the container had originated in Boston, prosecutors said.

The four guns came from federally licensed firearms dealers, according to prosecutors. They said Herrera was in contact with multiple co-conspirators throughout the shipment, and that a search of his phone turned up texts and a photo of multiple guns.

Evidence from the phone also showed that Herrera discussed numerous other shipments of firearms to the Dominican Republic, prosecutors said, including one in June 2023, after authorities had seized the shipment at Haina.

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