Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said Mark Vicars, 51,...

Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said Mark Vicars, 51, from Syosset, was sentenced to six years in prison on Sept. 8, 2017. Credit: NCDA

The Syosset man who posed as a federal air marshal and was found with an “arsenal” of weapons when officers pulled him over in December 2015 has been sentenced to six years in prison, officials said.

Mark Vicars, 51, was sentenced by Supreme Court Justice William Donnino on Friday, after the defendant had pleaded guilty in January to multiple felony weapon charges, Nassau District Attorney Madeline Singas said in a news release. Vicars will also be on post-release supervision for five years.

“This defendant possessed an arsenal of illegal weapons as he impersonated a federal air marshal,” Singas said.

But attorney Gregory LaMarca of Massapequa, who represented Vicars, called the sentence a “miscarriage of justice,” saying Vicars had no criminal record and was a victim of overzealous prosecution for living out a desire to be a law enforcement officer.

“He was painted to be a horrible person and he was anything but,” LaMarca said. “He had a fantasy about being in law enforcement . . . and he has some weapons but he committed no acts of violence whatsoever.”

LaMarca also said Vicars faces the prospect of deportation because he is an Irish national.

Based on a tip that Vicars was posing as an air marshal, Nassau police put Vicars under surveillance on Dec. 3, 2015, and stopped his vehicle on Jericho Turnpike at 7:40 a.m. that day.

Vicars activated some police-style emergency lights on the dashboard of his 2014 Dodge Durango as he was pulled over, authorities said. He showed officers a bogus shield and credentials that identified him as a federal air marshal.

Police found several weapons in the vehicle, including an “assault” rifle, a loaded pistol, a knife, a tactical vest with three high-capacity magazines and body armor as well as a windshield placard used by law enforcement officers to park in restricted zones.

At Vicars’ home, police executed a search warrant and found other handguns and thousands of rounds of ammunition.

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