Opinion ID: 531222
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Young McDowell's Testimony

Text: 10 On April 26, 1988, the appellant's son, John McDowell, III, testified before the Grand Jury in the District of Delaware. He testified that he owned and purchased the AR-15 firearm which the Delaware State Police seized in the December 20, 1987, search of his father's home. He explained that he had brought the gun to Delaware on December 19, 1987, from Florida, where he was a student. If this testimony were accurate, it would have completely exculpated his father for the charges relating to the AR-15. 11 The grand jury testimony directly conflicted with answers the younger McDowell had given to Treasury Department agents just four days prior. On April 22, 1988, McDowell was questioned at his mother's home and in his mother's presence by Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms Special Agent Swartswelder and Internal Revenue Commission Special Agent Amato. He told the special agents that he had never owned nor had ever purchased a firearm. He also told them that he had only been in Delaware once in 1987, at Eastertime, and that he had not seen his father since either 1984 or 1985. The interview ended when Swartswelder showed McDowell a copy of a firearm transaction dated April 23, 1987, for an AK-47 rifle which bore the signature of John W. McDowell, III. McDowell responded, This is pretty good, and refused to answer any more questions. Special Agent Amato then served him with a grand jury subpoena. 12 The accuracy of the version of the facts which the younger McDowell reported to the special agents is independently supported by the testimony of Charles Steele, owner of Steele's Gun Shop. Steele positively identified the AR-15 rifle seized as the gun which McDowell had brought to him for repairs in October 1987. Assuming this to be true, then McDowell had the gun prior to December 19, 1987, when his son claims first to have brought the gun from Florida. 13 The appellant, although admitting that his son's grand jury testimony was perjured, vehemently denies that he did anything to induce the perjury. He did, however, make three phone calls to his son during the time that the special agents were interviewing him. The senior McDowell alleges that he first called to welcome his son home. He next called to pass on advice from counsel that his son should not speak with the special agents unless subpoenaed to do so. The final call, he claims, he made not to his son at all, but to agent Amato to tell him to leave his son alone. Furthermore, appellant accompanied his son, along with McDowell III's mother (the appellant's ex-wife) and attorney, to the Grand Jury.