Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, August 11, 1995 TAG: 9508110055
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DIANE STRUZZI STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
As a Blacksburg gun dealer, Greene admitted to trading a part from a damaged semiautomatic rifle to a business associate. That transfer ultimately allowed the U.S. government to link Greene with a Pulaski County-based citizens' militia called the Blue Ridge Hunt Club.
But Greene testified that, when he made the trade with Paul Peterson, receiving a revolver in return, he believed he was merely getting rid of a piece of scrap metal. Since the part was considered unusable, the transfer didn't need to be written in his log book, he said. Federal law requires that dealers log all purchases and sales of firearms.
"I believed there'd be some good parts in it," Greene said. "[Peterson] had always been a mechanic, and maybe he could fix it."
But nothing in the federal statute "states that an unusable firearm needs to be logged in unless it is for a machine gun, which this was not," Greene said.
Ultimately, that gun part wound up in the hands of James Roy Mullins, founder of the Blue Ridge Hunt Club. He modified the weapon into a machine gun. According to prosecutors, Peterson arranged for Greene to sell part of the damaged rifle to Mullins.
Five men - including Greene, Peterson and Mullins - were charged last year after a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms investigation into the hunt club.
Prosecutors believe the club was formed to engage in armed battle against federal authorities if the government enacted stricter firearm laws. Mullins has said club members wanted to work against gun control through the political process.
U.S. District Judge Jackson Kiser dismissed two charges against Greene on Thursday - conspiracy and firearm possession.
In dismissing the conspiracy charge, Kiser explained that there was no "common purpose" shown between Greene and the other individuals.
"The only purpose Greene had was to dispose of some damaged merchandise he had," Kiser said. "There were various purposes at work here."
In the firearm charge, Kiser said that the gun part Greene traded was arguably not workable, therefore not a firearm under the federal statute.
The judge upheld the remaining four counts, which accuse Greene and Mullins of making, possessing and transferring a machine gun and of grinding off the serial number of the weapon.
But Greene denied that he had anything to do with grinding off the serial number, explaining that any gun dealer would know that taking off the surface layer of a serial number does not completely obliterate it.
"It doesn't do them much good ... [because] it is traceable," Greene said.
Greene also denied knowing Mullins.
Lawyers are expected to deliver their closing arguments today.
The remaining defendant, William Stump II, who is representing himself, is to be tried in September.
Mullins was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to seven of 13 federal firearm violations. Peterson, who pleaded guilty earlier this year to four charges, has not yet been sentenced.
And Dennis Frith pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiring to violate federal firearm laws. He will be sentenced later.
Memo: ***CORRECTION***