LITTLE ROCK — A month after an exploding grenade severely injured the chairman of the Arkansas State Medical Board, officers found operating instructions for the same type of grenade in the London home of Dr. Randeep Mann, a Pope County sheriff’s investigator testified Monday.
Lt. Rowdy Sweet, chief investigator for the sheriff’s office, told jurors on the fifth day of testimony in Mann’s federal trial, in which he is accused of orchestrating the bombing, about evidence that was seized during the execution of a search warrant on March 4, 2009, at Mann’s sprawling red-brick home at 313 Milky Way Lane.
The warrant was issued after the discovery a day earlier of a green military ammunition canister filled with live grenades that had been buried in woods about 60 feet up an incline from a cul de sac on Galaxy Lane, a short road thatjuts off Milky Way Lane.
The grenades in the canister were 40mm grenades that are fired from a grenade launcher, while the type of grenade that injured Dr. Trent Pierce was an MK3A2 hand grenade.
Mark Rinke, a London city employee, testified that he was checking waterlines in the rural area in the city limits when he climbed up the hill to urinate in the woods and his foot caught on something - which turned out to be an exposed corner of the box lid - in a slight depression in a clearing.
He noted that there are just four houses in that area, including the Mann house, which backs up to Lake Dardanelle. He said city workers don’t routinely inspect waterlines in that area but he did that day because he was checking out a friend’s concern about a possible swimming pool leak on Galaxy.
Rinke said he dug around the unknown buried object with his hands, and “I seen it was a box wrapped in black plastic.” He then decided he should leave it alone and returned to work.
But after work, Rinke returned with a co-worker, Ryan Kimble, who was, coincidentally, an ex-Marine and a U.S. Army reservist who years earlier had used 40mm practice rounds before being deployed to Iraq.
The men both said fresh dirt indicated the tall, rectangular box hadn’t been buried very long. After they unearthed it, and tore and cut through the duct tape holding the plastic sheeting tightly around it, they opened the lid, expecting they might find 7.62mm rounds, the type of ammunition listed on the box. Instead, they discovered what turned out to be 98 40mm live grenades in fabric pouches attached to belts.
Rinke said they called their boss - the mayor - who in turn called the sheriff’s office. Sweet said the sheriff’s office contacted the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which in turn sought a search warrant for the nearby Mann house.
On Friday, ATF Agent Tony McCutcheon testified that he had been to the Mann home on the evening of Feb. 4, 2009, the day of the bombing that severely injured Pierce outside his West Memphis home, because agents were interviewing potential suspects, including physicians like Mann who had been at odds with Pierce or the medical board.
McCutcheon testified that Mann, who operated the Skyline Medical Clinic in Russellville, and his wife, who ran the business side of the clinic, welcomed him and a state police investigator into their house, saying a patient had called to tell them that Pierce had been injured.
McCutcheon testified that,in questioning Mann about his whereabouts the day before the bombing, he learned that Mann had left his clinic at 4:48 p.m., stopped at Lowe’s Home Improvement warehouse in Russellville to buy plastic sheeting for gardening, then went with his wife to a fitness center from 8:45 p.m. until the center closed at 10 p.m.
Fitness center records later obtained through a subpoena verified that each of the Manns checked in at 9:14 p.m., and employees confirmed that the Manns had - as usual - stayed and worked out until the 10 p.m. closing time, the agent said.
He said Mann told him that once the couple arrived home, his wife, Sangeeta “Sue” Mann, went to bed, while Randeep Mann stayed up working on files and watching TV until going to bed at about midnight. The next morning, the Manns told the agent, Sue Mann got up first and went to the clinic about 8 a.m.
Special section
McCutcheon said Sue Mann’s cell phone records verify that she called her husband at 8:55 a.m., coinciding with the time both Manns say she gave him a wake-up call to come to the clinic.
The explosion in West Memphis occurred at 7:50 a.m. Prosecutors have said that, on the basis of witness reports and Pierce’s activities that night, including loading his vehicle at 10:30 p.m. or later, the grenade-rigged bomb in a spare tire was placed up against Pierce’s vehicle between 8:30 p.m. Feb. 3 and 6:30 a.m. Feb. 4.
McCutcheon testified that Mann showed the officers his extensive gun collection, and, “I noticed an M-16 witha grenade launcher attached to it.”
He asked Mann, a licensed firearms dealer, “Do you have any grenades to go with it?” He said Mann’s friendly demeanor changed suddenly, and he brushed off the question by saying, “no, no, no.”
“It was obvious that for some reason, that kind of pushed his buttons,” the agent testified.
Jurors saw photographs Friday and Monday of the inside and outside of the Manns’ home and watched a video showing the route from Milky Way Lane to the site along Galaxy Lane where the ammunition box was unearthed.
In addition to being charged in the bombing, Mann is accused of possessing 98 grenades, which are considered “weapons of war” and are illegal for a private citizen to own. Sue Mann is charged with obstructing the federal investigation of her husband.
Jurors also saw - in person - 18 high-powered weapons that Sweet testified were the only guns seized during the execution of the search warrant at the Manns’ home. They were just a fraction of the guns that were found inside the Mann residence but that he legally possessed.
Also found were five ammunition canisters like the one found buried about 300 yards away on the hillside along Galaxy Lane. There were two pairs of canisters with matching lot numbers. The fifth canister had the same lot number as the canister found buried, Sweet testified.
A photograph he took of a manual on hand grenades shows it sitting under a manila folder on top of a pile of papers in an open box. The box was on a shelf in a storage room in one of Mann’s three garages. The photographs also revealed several sports cars parked in the garages.
The trial resumes at 10 a.m. today before U.S. District Judge Brian S. Miller in Little Rock.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 07/20/2010