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HOUSTON (AP) - A former Vidor gun dealer was pardoned Friday by Texas Gov. Rick Perry of a felony conviction in Mexico in a case that went to the U.S. Supreme Court. Thomas Lamar "Tommy" Bean's appeal lost at the high court as he was trying to regain his rights after he was convicted in Mexico for having a box of ammunition that was left in his vehicle when he drove across the border. Bean and two of his employees were detained March 14, 1998 at the Mexico Customs checkpoint at the Gateway of the Americas Bridge. Bean and two of his employees had gone to Nuevo Laredo to dine after a gun show at La Posada. "We removed guns, ammunition and other items from the Suburban, but my people overlooked several boxes of ammo," Bean said in a Laredo Morning Times interview last December. "They were in full view of the inspectors. They seized 204 bullets." A friend and business associate paid $5,000 to an attorney to have the two employees released. Bean was eventually released from La Loma prison in September of 1998 as part of a prisoner exchange with the United States. "We are elated that it finally got done," Bean's attorney, Larry Hunter, said of the pardon. "What this does is it restores his civil rights on the state level. It will give us the opportunity to go back to the Secretary of Treasury to ask him to reconsider on the federal level. "At least we have one jurisdiction straightened out." The Mexican conviction will stand but will be removed from Bean's record in Texas, said Kathy Walt, a spokeswoman for Perry. "There is a state law that specifically allows a governor to grant a pardon for a violation of a foreign law," she said. "It would have no bearing on Mexico." Bean, 63, was a licensed federal firearms dealer when he was arrested in Mexico in March 1998. Before crossing the border for dinner, he had ordered his associates to remove any guns or ammunition from the vehicle, but more than 200 bullets in an armrest tray were overlooked. Bean spent five months in a Mexican prison before he was returned to the U.S. as part of a prisoner exchange program, then spent another month in a federal lockup. Bean, who now sells cars in Port Arthur, said his Mexican conviction ended his days as a gun dealer. After publicity about Bean's case, Mexico reduced the crime for bringing ammunition across its borders to a misdemeanor, and only a fine now is imposed on first-time offenders, according to court records. Last year, Bean took his case to the Supreme Court to regain his gun rights - something a district judge ruled he deserved to have restored. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also supported the judge's ruling. But the Supreme Court shut the door on his efforts, ruling felons can't go straight to court to get their gun rights restored and must go through a federal agency. That agency, however, has been banned by Congress since 1992 from processing requests. "This whole thing has just been a nightmare," Hunter said. "This whole plight has been because somebody else left some shells in the back of a Suburban." Felons are barred from owning or possessing guns in the United States if the conviction occurred in this country or elsewhere, but they can ask the government for an exception. A representative with the U.S Attorney's office in Beaumont could not immediately be reached for comment late Friday afternoon. U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson's office, which appealed the case to the Supreme Court, also did not immediately return a call from The Associated Press Friday.
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