[ LSD Silo ]

Topeka Capital-Journal, The, Mar 5, 2003 by Steve Fry Capital-Journal

View a map of Kansas missile silos, and find past coverage of the trial and the Wamego site.

www.cjonline.com

By Steve Fry

The Capital-Journal

After 28 days, 20 witnesses and the introduction of more than 900 pieces of evidence, a federal prosecutor seeking to convict two men of trafficking millions of doses of LSD rested the government's case Tuesday.

The 12 jurors and two alternates hearing the trial of William Leonard Pickard, 57, and Clyde Apperson, 47, were allowed to leave U.S. District Court in Topeka early Tuesday afternoon as freezing rain and drizzle iced northeast Kansas roads.

Pickard and Apperson are charged with conspiracy and possession of LSD with intent to distribute more than 10 grams of the drug. Law enforcement officers seized an LSD lab from a rental truck soon after the vehicle left a converted missile base near Wamego on Nov. 6, 2000.

Jury selection started Jan. 13, and the first witness, a Kansas Highway Patrol lieutenant, testified on Jan. 16. In 28 days of testimony, assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Hough called 20 witnesses and presented 906 exhibits, including scores of photographs of the LSD lab.

After jurors went home, defense attorneys William Rork, who represents Pickard, and Mark Bennett, who represents Apperson, sought to get the testimony of Krystle Cole, a defense witness, before jurors. But Cole's attorney, Michael Jackson, said his client wouldn't testify, based on her Fifth Amendment right against self- incrimination.

Hough said the U.S. attorney's office wouldn't give immunity for Cole's testimony. Rork and Bennett contended that U.S. District Judge Richard Rogers could order Hough to give immunity.

Bennett said he would seek to show jurors that Cole witnessed a Chicago transaction of a chemical essential to the production of LSD and that she would testify Apperson wasn't there.

After reading a report of a law enforcement interview of Cole, Rogers told prosecution and defense attorneys that he found nothing that would clear the defendants of the charges, and he dismissed Cole as a witness.

The trial resumes today when the defendants can call witnesses.

Steve Fry can be reached at (785) 295-1206 or sfry@cjonline.com.