Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 4, 1992 TAG: 9201040253
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: VICTORIA RATCLIFF STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
OFFICERS USE LIMOUSINE IN GUN BUST
Three federal firearms agents, a state trooper and the Halifax County sheriff's chief deputy hid inside a stretch limousine with darkened windows Thursday night to arrest an aspiring rap music star on gun-smuggling charges.William E. McDaniel Jr., also known as M.C. Kasper, and three other men were charged with conspiring to transport to New Jersey 44 firearms purchased in Virginia since April.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Tom Bondurant said McDaniel, 32, of East Orange, N.J., was "the mover and shaker" who organized the operation.
McDaniel had an initial appearance hearing Friday in U.S. Magistrate's Court in Roanoke.
McDaniel and his rap group, the Phase Four, have a recording coming out this month, according to McDaniel's attorney, Tony Anderson.
McDaniel also owns a limousine service that other rap artists use to travel to concerts, sources close to the investigation said.
According to an affidavit signed by special agent John Tuttle of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, a routine check of firearms records showed that a man from the Halifax County community of Alton had purchased 30 handguns in the Danville and South Boston area between April 11 and Nov. 9.
Agents learned that the man, who has been charged but not arrested, bought two semiautomatic pistols at a Danville gun shop on Monday and ordered several more.
Thursday, the man purchased seven firearms worth $2,100 while McDaniel and Jeffery Wilson Moody, 19, of Newark, N.J., waited outside, according to the affidavit. McDaniel had just cashed three money orders totaling $2,200.
McDaniel and Moody then went to a house and another man - Kenneth Harris, 26, of Alton - unloaded a box of guns from their car, the affidavit said.
Agents said they watched Harris and Moody load suitcases into a black 1985 Cadillac limousine with New Jersey plates and leave the residence about 8 p.m.
They were arrested as they were driving toward South Boston. Agents found 14 handguns wrapped in clothing in the suitcases and a bus ticket to Newark.
After talking about the best way to arrest McDaniel, who was still back at the house, agents decided to "commandeer the stretch limo as a Trojan horse," according to Jim Silvey, resident agent in charge of the ATF office in Roanoke.
They piled in the car and returned to the house, blowing the horn as they drove up the driveway.
Five or six people came out on the porch, Silvey said. But "then they saw it wasn't the homeboys driving it" and ran back inside.
McDaniel was arrested without incident.
U.S. Magistrate Glen E. Conrad ordered McDaniel held without bond temporarily to determine whether New Jersey officials want to charge him with violation of probation in that state.
Conrad set bond for Harris and Moody at $50,000.