Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 10, 1994                   TAG: 9408100065
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MICHAEL STOWE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

ATF ARRESTS, CHARGES 3RD MEMBER OF `HUNT CLUB'

William Darrell Stump II of Pulaski County, an outspoken critic of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, was arrested Thursday night and charged with possessing firearm silencers and firearms without national registration.

Stump, who was released on bond Thursday night, is the third member of the Blue Ridge Hunt Club to be charged with firearms violations in the last two weeks.

ATF agents charged James Mullins of Pulaski and Paul David Peterson of Blacksburg with trying to circumvent federal firearms laws by falsifying the identity of gun buyers.

Federal authorities say Mullins was the organizer of a group formed to illegally stockpile weapons in order to fight against tougher gun laws. ATF agents have one of Mullins' computer disks that says the group will destroy necessary targets, including telephone relay centers, bridges, airports and police officers.

At Mullins' preliminary hearing Tuesday, Magistrate Glen Conrad ruled that there was probable cause to certify charges of possessing unregistered silencers and facilitating the unlawful purchase of a firearm.

ATF agent T.S. Fairburn testified that Mullins believed a large number of police officers would want to join the Blue Ridge Hunt Club after it was fully organized.

As for the police officers who did not want to join, Mullins allegedly said, "Perhaps a bullet from a high-powered rifle through their windshield while they are on patrol might make them change their mind."

Fairburn also said that Mullins was so paranoid about being arrested that he always answered the door with a loaded .45-caliber pistol behind his back.

"Man, you are lucky you're not the ATF," Fairburn said Mullins allegedly told a friend who asked why he carried the gun.

Police seized eight guns, including one automatic firearm, from Mullins' Pulaski home when he was arrested.

Fairburn said Tuesday there is a possibility Mullins might have other gun cache sites near his home.

Assistant U.S. attorney Don Wolthuis urged Conrad to hold Mullins without bond until his trial, saying he was a threat to ATF agents and potential government witnesses.

Conrad ruled, however, that Mullins must undergo an examination and that bond will be set unless a doctor finds that the Pulaski man is acting under "some disillusionment."

Mullins' mother, Marie Yates, testified that she had noticed Mullins undergo mood swings in the last few months, but that she thought the Blue Ridge Hunt Club consisted of men that liked to "play Boy Scouts."

"I thought the group was just a bunch of men that like to go out camping and shoot their guns," she said.

"I've never known him to be the violent and vicious person like they have portrayed him."

After Mullins and Peterson were arrested, Stump, 34, blasted the ATF for trying to intimidate what he claimed was just a nonviolent political organization opposed to gun control.

A complaint filed against Stump says that he and Mullins were among club members who met May 22 in a remote section of Pulaski County, where Stump allegedly displayed and fired two .22-caliber semiautomatic rifles with unregistered silencers.