By Doug Thompson
Stephens Media
LITTLE ROCK — Investigators found 98 rounds for military grenade launchers buried about 875 feet from the home of a Pope County physician jailed on a federal weapons charge, according to court documents released Friday.
Dr. Randeep Mann, 50, of London, is scheduled to appear before a federal magistrate Monday in U.S. District Court in Little Rock.
Agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives arrested Mann on Wednesday night. He is charged with possession of unregistered weapons.
According to an affidavit the agency filed, a crew from the London Public Works Department had stopped about 5 p.m. Tuesday in a wooded area of the Pope County town when “one of them tripped over what he believed to be a black plastic bag buried in the ground.”
The worker dug up the black plastic and discovered a large green military canister wrapped in duct tap, the affidavit said. The employee cut open the duct tape and opened the canister, and inside he discovered what he believed to be several rounds of ammunition, it said.
Pope County sheriff’s deputies, who were called to the scene, took custody of the canister and its contents and contacted the federal bureau the next morning for assistance, the document said.
On Wednesday, an ATFE agent recognized the rounds as “a military high explosive round” for anti-personnel use designed to be fired from either an M-79 or M-203 grenade launcher, both 40-millimeter-bore weapons, according to the affidavit.
The M-79 is a Vietnam-era weapon fired from a shoulder-mounted launcher and the M-203 is a launcher that fits below the barrel of an infantryman’s rifle. There were 98 of the high-explosive rounds and one practice round, the affidavit said.
Authorities knew Mann possessed an M-203 grenade launcher because ATFE and Arkansas State Police had interviewed Mann on Feb. 4 “in regards to a separate investigation,” the affidavit said.
The grenade launcher is registered and legally owned, according to the affidavit. An ATFE spokesman declined to comment on the nature of the separate investigation.
The affidavit said state police obtained a search warrant for Mann’s home, and that authorities found five military canisters that were the exact shape, size and color as the canister recovered. One of the lot numbers on the military canisters matched the canister recovered in the wooded area, it said.
Police also found 110 fully automatic weapons. Most were legally registered to Mann, but investigators were unable to determine if 17 of the machine guns were legally registered to the doctor, the affidavit said.
None of the rounds uncovered outside Mann’s residence was registered to him and he was arrested for possession of the rounds found buried.
An AFTE spokesman said Mann’s arrest resulted solely from the discovery of grenades in Pope County and was not part of an investigation into a car bombing that injured the chairman of the state Medical Board last month.
On Feb. 4, Dr. Trent Pierce of West Memphis was critically wounded when an explosive device attached to his car went off.
Mann was disciplined by the medical board in July 2006. The board restricted his prescription-writing privileges after officials said several of his patients died from a lethal mix of drugs or an overdose of prescription medicines.
Mann and the board reached an agreement, ending a hearing on charges against the doctor. Under the agreement, he was allowed to keep his medical license but barred from prescribing narcotics.
