Bout ‘Jumped’ at Chance to Sell Terrorists Guns, U.S. Says

Viktor Bout, the alleged international arms dealer once called the “merchant of death,” agreed to sell weapons to a foreign terrorist group he believed planned to kill Americans, a prosecutor said.

“He jumped at the opportunity,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Brendan McGuire said during opening arguments of Bout’s trial, which began today in federal court in Manhattan before U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin.