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Posted: 1/14/2002 9:29:39 PM EDT
All I can say is these ATF agents are heroes. Let's roll!

[url]meek.sublette.com/roundup/v95n1/v95n1s2.htm[/url]

ATF Search - Coerced Consent
Man agrees to search at gunpoint
by Jason Mundy

At approximately 9:30 on a quiet Sunday morning last month, Bargerville resident Craig Storer woke to someone pounding so hard on his front door that it was "literally shaking the trailer." Running in his pajamas to look out the window, Mr. Storer saw a Deputy Sheriff's truck and a metallic silver vehicle parked in his driveway. Unknown to Mr. Storer, outside a swarm of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) agents and Sublette County Sheriff's deputies had been positioned at various locations around his bright blue trailer. Law enforcement officers were also positioned on Highway 191, leading toward the frontage road where Mr. Storer's trailer is located.

ATF agents and Sheriff's deputies were there to search Mr. Storer's trailer for illegal firearms. According to Sheriff's Detective, Paul Raftery, the Sheriff's office had information that Mr. Storer possessed automatic weapons and explosives. Because the Sheriff's office has no jurisdiction to enforce laws pertaining to illegal firearms, the ATF was contacted. The ATF began its own investigation of Mr. Storer, said Mr. Raftery.

The ATF and the Sheriff's deputies arrived at Mr. Storer's trailer without a search warrant.

According to Mr. Raftery, the ATF had been working with the Assistant U.S. Attorney and was in the process of getting a warrant, but it was the decision of Resident Agent in Charge, Gilbert Salinas of the ATF office in Cheyenne, to go ahead with the planned raid, without one.

Jeans still in his hand, Mr. Storer opened the door of the trailer leading outside to a small front porch. What he saw was the muzzle of a pistol pointing directly at his head. His first thought was to back up.

"I thought I was being robbed," said Mr. Storer.

Officers began shouting orders for Mr. Storer to turn around. As he did, he caught sight of two other men outside a small window pointing pistols in his direction. According to Mr. Storer, none of the men who had guns pointed at him identified themselves as law enforcement officers.

One of the ATF agents ordered Mr. Storer to stand face against a nearby wall with his hands on his head, and then proceeded to search him.

"At the time I still didn't realize that this was ATF," he said.

The agent then asked who was in the house and Mr. Storer called out to his girlfriend, who was in the back bedroom.

"They told me they were there to search the house. I asked then if they had a warrant," said Mr. Storer. They did not. An ATF agent instead presented Mr. Storer with a consent form to sign allowing the ATF agents and the Sheriff's deputies to search his trailer.

Mr. Storer, still in his pajamas and his hands on his head, surrounded by armed officers, was given an option. He and his girlfriend, who was wearing a t-shirt and little else, could wait outside in the cold until the ATF could obtain a warrant on a Sunday morning, or he could just sign the consent.

Link Posted: 1/14/2002 9:30:23 PM EDT
[#1]
(continued)

Mr. Storer was furious that both law enforcement agencies arrived to search his trailer with no warrant, based on information provided to the ATF and deputies by informants. He said if they ATF was keeping surveillance on him and had received warnings about supposed illegal weapons, they should have gotten a warrant.

"This sort of think happened in Nazi Germany," said Mr. Storer.

" My girlfriend was freaking out. I'm thinking do I sign or don't I? I don't owe them anything. I haven't done anything wrong."

Mr. Storer, still at gunpoint, decided to sign the consent form.

Once they had consent, agents began asking Mr. Storer if he had any illegal weapons. They wanted to know what guns he had, how many guns he had, and where they were located. They asked him if he had or had made any silencers. For the next twenty minutes ATF agents and Sheriff's deputies searched the trailer. They rummaged through boxes, examined gun cases and rifled through shelves looking for illegal firearms and parts kits that could convert guns from semi-automatic to fully automatic.

What they found were a couple of shotguns, two semi-automatic assault rifles ( a replica of an AK-47 and an M-16) a 9mm Berreta pistol, a .50 caliber single-shot, long-range rifle and a few other standard field rifles. [b]All the guns found were legal. However, the .50 caliber did raise some eyebrows with ATF agents, said Mr. Storer.[/b]

"I've shot rounds through a car hood from a mile away with this gun," said Mr. Storer, as he displayed the rifle. The length of the gun is about 3 feet long, painted camouflage and looks menacing. Mr. Storer said there is a movement by the US government to classify the gun as a destructive weapon, which could make it illegal to purchase, even as a parts kit.

[b]But the ATF did not confiscate the gun, which they had the legal authority to do under new anti-terrorism laws passed after Sept. 11.[/b] Mr. Storer readily admitted that he had bought the gun as a parts kit from a dealer, who he thought, had been arrested earlier for having 32 unregistered machine guns.

As the search continued, one sheriff's deputy emerged from the back bedroom and walked into where Mr. Storer, his girlfriend and a few agents and deputies were sitting, carrying a small bottle containing a white powder.

"They actually asked me if it was Anthrax," said Mr. Storer. Instead of Anthrax, the powder was cretonne, a dietary supplement for weightlifters, said Mr. Storer. The bottle and powder were taken and have not been returned by Sheriff's Deputies," he said.

After the search was conducted, which did not turn up anything illegal, both agencies vacated the trailer, leaving Mr. Storer angered and dumbfounded at what just happened.

"One of the agents told me as he was leaving that it must of been one of my doper friends that turned me in. That really pissed me off."

Mr. Storer has no prior convictions in Wyoming and said that his record is completely clean, except for a DUI a couple of years ago. He emphasized how frightening it was that a government agency could barge in his home and intimidate him into signing a consent to search form simply on the claims of an informant.

"My home is my sovereignty. My entire soul, everything I have in this world was bared to Sublette County and the Federal Government, legally," he concluded.
Link Posted: 1/14/2002 10:11:01 PM EDT
[#2]
Sounds like Mr. Storer can call the FBI and claim his money.. He's gonna make a lot of money for turning in those JB-terrorists!
Enough money to by him many more 50 cals.

Keving67
Link Posted: 1/14/2002 11:01:43 PM EDT
[#3]
There is a book called "You and the Police" written by someone using a pen name of Boston T. Party.  In the book the author identifys 3 types of cops: the Good Cop, the Intimidating Cop, and the Rogue Cop.  His description of the Rogue Cop is informative:

The Rogue Cop is beyond reason.  Knowing the law will rarely help when he is rousting you.  Then and there, you can probably only fight or surrender.  Either way, it won't be pretty.

Many, if not most, federal agents are Rogue Cops.  Backed by tremendous resources, a vast propaganda organ, and a hierarchy willing to usurp Liberty-- these hyena packs seemingly get away with anything.

They get to wear black ninja suits and masks, kick in doors without announcement, terrorize old people for hours (DEA), shove pregnant women around into miscarrying (BATF), wantonly destroy private property (IRS, etc.), stomp family pets to death (again, the BATF), shoot 13 y/o boys in the back on their own property (U.S. Marshals at Ruby Ridge, Idaho), shoot mothers holding infants in the face with high-powered rifles (FBI murderer Lon Horiuchi at Ruby Ridge), gun you down if you mistake them as a criminal band of marauders (DEA, etc.), and flood a homestead church with hundreds of CS gas canisters-- knowing full well that the 17 children inside did not have gas masks (FBI at Waco).
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 1:41:50 AM EDT
[#4]
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 1:45:40 AM EDT
[#5]
"Here lies George Johnson, hanged by mistake, 1882, he was right, we was wrong, but we strung him up, and now he's gone."
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 3:08:30 AM EDT
[#6]
Quoted:
(continued)

[b]But the ATF did not confiscate the gun, which they had the legal authority to do under new anti-terrorism laws passed after Sept. 11.[/b]
View Quote


Huh?  How is this possible if they say he has no illegal weapons and has done nothing wrong?

Link Posted: 1/15/2002 4:21:47 AM EDT
[#7]
Quoted:
Huh?  How is this possible if they say he has no illegal weapons and has done nothing wrong?
View Quote


Simple, the agent states for the record "he may be a terrorist, mein fuhrer.  Better take his stuff and lock him up for the good of society, sieg heil!"
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 4:29:57 AM EDT
[#8]
While we are in the process of reclaiming our lost rights as American citizens, please note what these agents were looking for - [b]anything[/b] that could conceivably be used to file a criminal charge against him!

It is always a good thing to go through your stuff the way a 'rogue' ATF agent might go through your stuff, with the purpose of finding and removing [b]anything[/b] that could possibly be used against you!

You know that in the early years of AR-15 sales to the public, a lot of ARs left the Colt plant with 'M-16' bolt carriers, rather than the 'AR-15' bolt carriers. Since the two were more or less functionally identical, no one thought much about it.

Now, more than a quarter century later, if your original Colt AR-15 SP1 were to be viewed by an ATF agent, and that agent discovered an M-16 bolt carrier in the weapon, what do you think the odds might be that the weapon would be confiscated and you arrested?

Moral: if you have AR-15s in your possession, then do not have any, [b]any[/b] M-16-only parts in your possession, in your home, or anywhere on your property!

BTW, an FBI agent friend of mine came to my office and gave me a video called something like 'The Real Trial of Terry McNichols' or something like that. He told me that someone had given the tape to him and that he thought I might find it informative. Yeah, really.

I threw the tape into the common trash can before I left the office that day. No reason in the world to have such crap around.

Eric The(WordToTheWise)Hun[>]:)]
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 5:42:44 AM EDT
[#9]


There, but for the grace of God, go I.


Link Posted: 1/15/2002 5:57:51 AM EDT
[#10]
"One of the agents told me as he was leaving that it must of been one of my doper friends that turned me in. That really pissed me off."
View Quote

Where do they find these guys?  The ATF uniform ought to be a large rubber condom, as befits a prick.  Like Leslie Nielsen wore in one of those movies of his, I forget which one.
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 7:05:51 AM EDT
[#11]
The ATF F*cks up again! Is anyone surprised...
Link Posted: 1/15/2002 7:32:08 AM EDT
[#12]
You know...

Threads like this really bother me.  Why?  Because I do ALOT of shooting at my place.  I have even had AR15ers come down with legal, full auto weapons.  Not to mention the 'bump firing' that has been done that sounds like full auto.

I fully expect the ATF to show up one day.  No kidding.  I am going to do the 'rogue agent' to my house.  

Man, I hate what this country has come to.  An anonymous informant is all it takes to lose your right to privacy.

Saw a T-shirt on TV the other day, it said "Shoot Informants, Not Drugs"  'nuf sed.

TheRedGoat
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