(CT) When A Potato Is Deadly Serious

Drizzt · June 6, 2001, 11:52 AM

Gee, outlawing silencers sure works, doesn't it? I was just using this as an example of people always finding a way around the laws; ergo, outlawing guns won't do much good......

When A Potato Is Deadly Serious
06/06/01

When nearly $30,000 disappeared from a drug dealer's condominium on a snowy weekend in January 1998, the government says, an enforcer named Alpha McQueen tried to scare three young women into admitting the theft.

The women say he used his fist, a gun and a knife.

Then, according to testimony Tuesday in federal court in Hartford, McQueen threatened them with an object that could cost him a mandatory 25 years in prison - an uncooked Idaho potato.

In a case that prosecution and defense lawyers say is unprecedented, the government is trying to persuade a jury that McQueen used the potato as a silencer by sticking it on the barrel of his semiautomatic pistol.

Using a silencer-equipped firearm during a drug crime is punishable by a mandatory 30 years in prison: five years for using the gun, to be followed by 25 years for use of a silencer.

A co-defendant, Dale Stewart, pleaded guilty earlier this month to drug conspiracy and weapons charges, but his lawyer, William Paetzhold, hastened to add, "He didn't plead to the potato."

The case is generating smirks in legal circles, where it's known as "the big potato." But there is little else amusing about the case, which is linked to one of Hartford's most gruesome crimes: the torture-killings in June 1998 of 36-year-old Audley Patrick Palmer and one of his young girlfriends, Samantha Mitto. She was 17 or 18.

Palmer was a drug dealer who sold about 100 pounds of marijuana every month from an apartment he rented at 250 Main St., a block north of the federal courthouse in Hartford. He also was the owner of nearly $30,000 that disappeared in January 1998 from a Wethersfield condominium he shared with another girlfriend, Tanesha Davis, now 22.

Davis testified that she met Palmer, known as "Mr. P.," when she was 14. They began dating a year later and she moved into his condo on Village Lane in Wethersfield a month before her 18th birthday. During an hour of emotional testimony, she described how she and two girlfriends were terrorized in January 1998 after the money disappeared while Palmer was on one of his frequent trips to Jamaica.

Davis said she had removed the money during a snowstorm from its hiding place, a fireplace flue. She needed to light a fire, because the storm knocked out power. After going to two nightclubs with a cousin, Marvia Taylor, and a friend, Shellaine Rose, Davis noticed the money was missing.

She suspected one of Palmer's associates, but Palmer's two enforcers, McQueen and Stewart, accused her and the two other women. They focused on Rose, who had spent the night at the condo.

"Al asked me if I needed to go somewhere or take a walk," Davis said.

She testified she took that to mean he was going to kill her friends. She refused to leave.

"Al said killing was their occupation in Jamaica," she said.

"Al said that?" prosecutor David Ring asked.

"Yeah," she replied.

Davis said McQueen disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a potato on his pistol. It had been cut in half, with a hole carved in line with the barrel.

At one point, he gagged Rose with duct tape and tried to stab her in the leg, Davis said. The men eventually left without shooting the women, either satisfied they were innocent or frightened by several phone calls from Rose's mother, which left the impression Rose's mother knew who was with her daughter, Rose testified.

Davis said she was haunted by the episode and attempted suicide by swallowing a bottle of sleeping pills. She was hospitalized for five days.

Taylor also testified about the potato, though Rose, who was bound, said she never noticed it.

"You didn't see a potato on the end of that gun?" defense lawyer David Wenc asked on cross-examination.

"No, I did not," she replied.

The government believes McQueen, who is charged with conspiracy to distribute marijuana and use of a silencer-equipped firearm, was an enforcer Palmer recruited from his native Jamaica.

Based on some of the testimony Tuesday, McQueen may be a suspect in the homicides of Palmer and Mitto. McQueen's former girlfriend, Natasha Burchell, testified Tuesday that McQueen was in possession of Palmer's belongings just hours after the killings.

Palmer was found dead June 9, strapped to a chair. He was gagged and had suffered numerous knife wounds, including a slashed throat. Mitto was found on a blood-soaked mattress. She was stabbed and both her Achilles' tendons were cut.

McQueen and Stewart were indicted on the weapons and conspiracy charges after an investigation by a federal task force, including FBI agents and Hartford detectives, into unsolved murders involving the Jamaican drug trade.

http://www.ctnow.com/scripts/editori...e=&ck=&ver=3.0

Mark D · June 6, 2001, 12:03 PM

At least the dealer reaped his harvest.

DorGunR · June 6, 2001, 12:15 PM

Ahhhhh....the old potato on the end of a gun trick.

**pax** · June 6, 2001, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Using a silencer-equipped firearm during a drug crime is punishable by a mandatory 30 years in prison: five years for using the gun, to be followed by 25 years for use of a silencer.

Wait a minute here.

A thug gets five years for "using a gun" -- that is, for killing or threatening to kill some schlub.

But the same thug could receive twenty-five years for using a silencer?!?

Something is desperately wrong with this picture.

pax

Quartus · June 6, 2001, 01:51 PM

Has anyone here actually tried using a potato (or potatoe

) as a silencer?

I doubt you'd get much silencing from it. I'm pretty sure you'd blow the potatoe all over the room. MAybe not so bad with a 9mm, but can you picture it with a .44 Mag? "Go ahead, punk. Make my salad."

This gives a whole new twist to potato cannons!

MellowMikey · June 6, 2001, 02:32 PM

And when the woman were interviewed by local authorities, they said, "It's true, I'd a Ho."
Hehe

Now where are my meds.

George Hill · June 6, 2001, 03:05 PM

What an idiot - you dont use a Potato... you use a Yam!

HankB · June 6, 2001, 03:39 PM

The original spud gun?

Now I finally know what those old detective novels meant when they referred to a woman being accosted by a "masher" . . .

Hmmm...maybe THAT'S why they outlawed rifles with bayonet lugs. A long bayonet could hold LOTS of spuds on the end of the gun! Maybe even have room for carrots, lettuce, parsley...

Navy joe · June 6, 2001, 05:10 PM

no, no officer, I da pimp ,she da ho!

Looks like the potato head clan is pretty much screwed, dubious silencing characteristics, but I heard Danny Qualye pulled it off once.

Quartus · June 6, 2001, 05:22 PM

Hey! Hey! For the record, folks, "potatoe" IS correct! Check the older dictionaries.

That said, Mr. Quayle is still an artist at butchering a sentence. But I'd a ho lot rather have him as Pres than our current "Mr. Nice Guy"!!

(Oooh, ouch. But I couldn't resist.)

GSB · June 6, 2001, 09:37 PM

"What an idiot - you dont use a Potato... you use a Yam!" -- George Hill

I would caution against any Yam-related violence. You could be charged with murder:

http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a38da909f2965.htm

**pax** · June 6, 2001, 10:27 PM

I'm afraid this post will leave some of you spuddering, but here goes:

"Cogito, ergo spud." -- I think, therefore I yam.

You don't have to thank me.

pax

45King · June 7, 2001, 04:58 AM

pax: <grooooaaaaannnn>

OK, one bad pun deserves another.

An Irish potato and an Idaho potato got married and had a baby daughter, a sweet potato.
The day she turned 18, she announced to her parents, "I'm going to marry Tom Brokaw."
"Absolutely not!" replied her father.
"Why not?" she asked.
"Because he's just a comentator!"

Spud guns, spud silencers....see what those vegans have done?

Apple a Day · June 7, 2001, 05:08 AM

You don't want to use a spud during a crime... too many EYE witnesses

ATTICUS · June 7, 2001, 09:05 AM

I tried the potato silencer (30 something years ago) on a .22 single shot rifle. Very loud - very messy. I did this in my parents backyard at 11 pm. Was a very bad error in judgement.

Southla1 · June 7, 2001, 10:06 AM

ATTICUS, just for the record that baby bottle nipple taped over the barrel of a 22 bolt action does not work either! Cat was still dead, but it turned in to almost a media event!

sbryce · June 8, 2001, 12:41 AM

The second Literary was entirely charades, and Pa carried off the honors of the whole evening. Nobody could guess his charade.

He played it alone, in his everyday clothes. Walking up the central aisle, he carried two small potatoes before him on the blade of his ax. That was all.

Then he stood twinkling, teasing the crowd, and giving hints. "It has to do with the Bible," he said. "Why, every one of you knows it." He said, "It's something you often consult." He even said, "It's helpful in understanding Saint Paul." He teased, "Don't tell me you all give up!"

Every last one of them had to give up, and Laura was almost bursting with pride and delight when at last Pa told them, "It's Commentators on the Ac's."

--From Little Town on the Prairie

--Denise
who is in the midst of reading this book aloud to her children.

June 6, 2001, 12:15 PM	#3
DorGunR Senior Member Join Date: January 13, 2000 Location: Maryland Posts: 1,126	Ahhhhh....the old potato on the end of a gun trick. __________________ "Lead, follow or get the HELL out of the way." U.S. Army 1950 - 1972 NRA Life Member Vietnam 1966/67 - 1969/70

June 6, 2001, 02:32 PM	#6
MellowMikey Senior Member Join Date: November 27, 2000 Location: Arizona Territory Posts: 271	Taters and guns, just don't mix. And when the woman were interviewed by local authorities, they said, "It's true, I'd a Ho." Hehe Now where are my meds.

June 6, 2001, 05:22 PM	#10
Quartus Senior Member Join Date: May 8, 2001 Location: Virginia Posts: 3,838	Hey! Hey! For the record, folks, "potatoe" IS correct! Check the older dictionaries. That said, Mr. Quayle is still an artist at butchering a sentence. But I'd a ho lot rather have him as Pres than our current "Mr. Nice Guy"!! (Oooh, ouch. But I couldn't resist.) __________________ . Better to know what you don't know than to think you know what you don't know.

June 7, 2001, 04:58 AM	#13
45King Senior Member Join Date: March 12, 1999 Location: Columbia, SC Posts: 1,035	pax: <grooooaaaaannnn> OK, one bad pun deserves another. An Irish potato and an Idaho potato got married and had a baby daughter, a sweet potato. The day she turned 18, she announced to her parents, "I'm going to marry Tom Brokaw." "Absolutely not!" replied her father. "Why not?" she asked. "Because he's just a comentator!" Spud guns, spud silencers....see what those vegans have done? __________________ Shoot straight, stay safe, and have a blessed day. Regards, Richard Freedom is a consequence of the exercising of rights.

June 7, 2001, 05:08 AM	#14
Apple a Day Senior Member Join Date: March 29, 2000 Location: Poquoson,Virginia Posts: 1,452	You don't want to use a spud during a crime... too many EYE witnesses __________________ THose who use arms well cultivate the Way and keep the rules. Thus they can govern in such a way as to prevail over the corrupt. - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

June 6, 2001, 11:52 AM	#1
Drizzt Senior Member Join Date: October 25, 2000 Location: Going Out of My Head at a Rapid Pace..... Posts: 2,511	Gee, outlawing silencers sure works, doesn't it? I was just using this as an example of people always finding a way around the laws; ergo, outlawing guns won't do much good...... When A Potato Is Deadly Serious 06/06/01 When nearly $30,000 disappeared from a drug dealer's condominium on a snowy weekend in January 1998, the government says, an enforcer named Alpha McQueen tried to scare three young women into admitting the theft. The women say he used his fist, a gun and a knife. Then, according to testimony Tuesday in federal court in Hartford, McQueen threatened them with an object that could cost him a mandatory 25 years in prison - an uncooked Idaho potato. In a case that prosecution and defense lawyers say is unprecedented, the government is trying to persuade a jury that McQueen used the potato as a silencer by sticking it on the barrel of his semiautomatic pistol. Using a silencer-equipped firearm during a drug crime is punishable by a mandatory 30 years in prison: five years for using the gun, to be followed by 25 years for use of a silencer. A co-defendant, Dale Stewart, pleaded guilty earlier this month to drug conspiracy and weapons charges, but his lawyer, William Paetzhold, hastened to add, "He didn't plead to the potato." The case is generating smirks in legal circles, where it's known as "the big potato." But there is little else amusing about the case, which is linked to one of Hartford's most gruesome crimes: the torture-killings in June 1998 of 36-year-old Audley Patrick Palmer and one of his young girlfriends, Samantha Mitto. She was 17 or 18. Palmer was a drug dealer who sold about 100 pounds of marijuana every month from an apartment he rented at 250 Main St., a block north of the federal courthouse in Hartford. He also was the owner of nearly $30,000 that disappeared in January 1998 from a Wethersfield condominium he shared with another girlfriend, Tanesha Davis, now 22. Davis testified that she met Palmer, known as "Mr. P.," when she was 14. They began dating a year later and she moved into his condo on Village Lane in Wethersfield a month before her 18th birthday. During an hour of emotional testimony, she described how she and two girlfriends were terrorized in January 1998 after the money disappeared while Palmer was on one of his frequent trips to Jamaica. Davis said she had removed the money during a snowstorm from its hiding place, a fireplace flue. She needed to light a fire, because the storm knocked out power. After going to two nightclubs with a cousin, Marvia Taylor, and a friend, Shellaine Rose, Davis noticed the money was missing. She suspected one of Palmer's associates, but Palmer's two enforcers, McQueen and Stewart, accused her and the two other women. They focused on Rose, who had spent the night at the condo. "Al asked me if I needed to go somewhere or take a walk," Davis said. She testified she took that to mean he was going to kill her friends. She refused to leave. "Al said killing was their occupation in Jamaica," she said. "Al said that?" prosecutor David Ring asked. "Yeah," she replied. Davis said McQueen disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a potato on his pistol. It had been cut in half, with a hole carved in line with the barrel. At one point, he gagged Rose with duct tape and tried to stab her in the leg, Davis said. The men eventually left without shooting the women, either satisfied they were innocent or frightened by several phone calls from Rose's mother, which left the impression Rose's mother knew who was with her daughter, Rose testified. Davis said she was haunted by the episode and attempted suicide by swallowing a bottle of sleeping pills. She was hospitalized for five days. Taylor also testified about the potato, though Rose, who was bound, said she never noticed it. "You didn't see a potato on the end of that gun?" defense lawyer David Wenc asked on cross-examination. "No, I did not," she replied. The government believes McQueen, who is charged with conspiracy to distribute marijuana and use of a silencer-equipped firearm, was an enforcer Palmer recruited from his native Jamaica. Based on some of the testimony Tuesday, McQueen may be a suspect in the homicides of Palmer and Mitto. McQueen's former girlfriend, Natasha Burchell, testified Tuesday that McQueen was in possession of Palmer's belongings just hours after the killings. Palmer was found dead June 9, strapped to a chair. He was gagged and had suffered numerous knife wounds, including a slashed throat. Mitto was found on a blood-soaked mattress. She was stabbed and both her Achilles' tendons were cut. McQueen and Stewart were indicted on the weapons and conspiracy charges after an investigation by a federal task force, including FBI agents and Hartford detectives, into unsolved murders involving the Jamaican drug trade. http://www.ctnow.com/scripts/editori...e=&ck=&ver=3.0

June 6, 2001, 12:03 PM	#2
Mark D Senior Member Join Date: October 4, 2000 Posts: 385	At least the dealer reaped his harvest.

June 6, 2001, 01:51 PM	#5
Quartus Senior Member Join Date: May 8, 2001 Location: Virginia Posts: 3,838	Has anyone here actually tried using a potato (or potatoe ) as a silencer? I doubt you'd get much silencing from it. I'm pretty sure you'd blow the potatoe all over the room. MAybe not so bad with a 9mm, but can you picture it with a .44 Mag? "Go ahead, punk. Make my salad." This gives a whole new twist to potato cannons!

June 6, 2001, 03:05 PM	#7
George Hill Staff Alumnus Join Date: October 14, 1998 Location: Lapoint, Utah Posts: 11,479	What an idiot - you dont use a Potato... you use a Yam!

June 6, 2001, 03:39 PM	#8
HankB Senior Member Join Date: March 30, 2000 Location: Central Texas, outside of Austin Posts: 1,670	The original spud gun? Now I finally know what those old detective novels meant when they referred to a woman being accosted by a "masher" . . . Hmmm...maybe THAT'S why they outlawed rifles with bayonet lugs. A long bayonet could hold LOTS of spuds on the end of the gun! Maybe even have room for carrots, lettuce, parsley...

June 6, 2001, 05:10 PM	#9
Navy joe Senior Member Join Date: January 28, 2001 Location: VA, USA Posts: 1,589	no, no officer, I da pimp ,she da ho! Looks like the potato head clan is pretty much screwed, dubious silencing characteristics, but I heard Danny Qualye pulled it off once.

June 6, 2001, 09:37 PM	#11
GSB Senior Member Join Date: March 20, 2001 Location: Florida Posts: 940	"What an idiot - you dont use a Potato... you use a Yam!" -- George Hill I would caution against any Yam-related violence. You could be charged with murder: http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a38da909f2965.htm

June 6, 2001, 10:27 PM	#12
pax Staff Join Date: May 16, 2000 Location: Washington state Posts: 4,626	I'm afraid this post will leave some of you spuddering, but here goes: "Cogito, ergo spud." -- I think, therefore I yam. You don't have to thank me. pax

June 7, 2001, 09:05 AM	#15
ATTICUS Senior Member Join Date: June 7, 1999 Location: Central Ohio Posts: 2,103	I tried the potato silencer (30 something years ago) on a .22 single shot rifle. Very loud - very messy. I did this in my parents backyard at 11 pm. Was a very bad error in judgement.

June 7, 2001, 10:06 AM	#16
Southla1 Senior Member Join Date: March 19, 2000 Location: Jeanerette, La. Near the Heart of the great Atchafalaya Basin Swamp Posts: 1,999	ATTICUS, just for the record that baby bottle nipple taped over the barrel of a 22 bolt action does not work either! Cat was still dead, but it turned in to almost a media event! __________________ Carlyle Hebert Molon labe!!

June 8, 2001, 12:41 AM	#17
sbryce Senior Member Join Date: August 28, 1999 Location: Utah, USA Posts: 495	Courtesy of Laura Ingalls Wilder The second Literary was entirely charades, and Pa carried off the honors of the whole evening. Nobody could guess his charade. He played it alone, in his everyday clothes. Walking up the central aisle, he carried two small potatoes before him on the blade of his ax. That was all. Then he stood twinkling, teasing the crowd, and giving hints. "It has to do with the Bible," he said. "Why, every one of you knows it." He said, "It's something you often consult." He even said, "It's helpful in understanding Saint Paul." He teased, "Don't tell me you all give up!" Every last one of them had to give up, and Laura was almost bursting with pride and delight when at last Pa told them, "It's Commentators on the Ac's." --From Little Town on the Prairie --Denise who is in the midst of reading this book aloud to her children.