SALT LAKE CITY — For much of 2016, an important question weighed heavy on the minds of federal prosecutors, agents and detectives retracing the history of 9mm handgun used to kill Unified Police officer Doug Barney.

They wanted to know how a convicted felon got his hands on that gun.

Barney was gunned down by parole fugitive Cory Henderson on Jan. 17, 2016. Henderson shot and injured police officer Jon Ritchie before police shot and killed Henderson.

United States attorney for Utah John Huber had a hunch the gun Henderson was carrying had a checkered history and had traveled from "one crook to the next, from one violent criminal to another violent criminal."

Immediately after the crime, Huber commissioned agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to unravel the trail that would eventually shine a light on a dark world where criminals connect to trade guns for drugs.

"It's almost a hell, and when crimes occur in hell there are no angels as witnesses," said Huber.

ATF agents teamed up with UPD gang detectives to persuade reluctant witnesses and informants to start talking.

"They were able to determine that the gun traveled to five different people before ultimately it was given to Cory Henderson," said Brian Embley, resident agent in charge of the ATF in Salt Lake City.

Within days of the crime, a national database search of the gun's serial number gave investigators their first lead. It revealed a man had legally purchased the gun from a Salt Lake City pawn shop in 2012.

Investigators say the man gave it away as a gift.

By the spring of 2015, a family member grew nervous about having the gun around and gave it to her mom for safekeeping.

It's at this point where trouble begins, according to the investigation and court records.

The woman who accepted the gun for safekeeping was Karolyn Seidel, a convicted felon who could not legally have a gun.

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She kept it in her home for several months until late 2015. Seidel had rented out a room in her home to a heroin user who eventually took the gun to a drug deal on Dec. 20, less than a month before Barney was killed.

"When people who live on the dark side, the underbelly of our society, when they get ahold of this gun, it moved at lightning speed," said Huber.

It was during an encounter the drug addict had with a man by the name of Allen Joe Katoa that the gun changed hands again.

"Joe Katoa is a documented Tongan Crip gang member," said UPD gang detective Isekia Afatasi.

Kotoa had the gun about three weeks. By then, parolee Henderson had absconded from a Utah Department of Corrections halfway house in Salt Lake City and was on the run from the law. Henderson came to Katoa on Jan. 13 in need of a gun, according to investigators.

"In this world, you know, firearms are traded for narcotics, they're traded for protection," said Afatasi.

It was four days later, on Jan. 17, 2016, that Henderson used the gun to kill Barney and injure Ritchie.

Not everyone involved in this case was criminally charged.

But in the end, Seidel pleaded guilty to one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm and is serving probation.

Katoa went to trial, and in November the case ended in a hung jury.

Huber wonders if the jury failed to convict Katoa because "it's hard for us to imagine, as law-abiding citizens, that there is this lawless, seedy side to our beautiful community."

But federal prosecutors, agents and detectives were determined to try Katoa again. And as they prepared for a second trial, he pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession a firearm. He was sentenced to a year in prison.

The case is now closed.

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