By David S. Cloud
Staff Reporter of the
WALL STREET JOURNAL

RICHMOND, VA-David Schiller says he can make a federal case out of just about anything involving guns. He's right. For the past two years, Mr. Schiller has used his powers as an assistant U.S. attorney to transfer mundane arrests by local police here to the federal court system. His zealous pursuit of almost anyone caught violating even the most obscure federal gun law has sent 200 people to prison, which Mr. Schiller's supporters say helps explain a dramatic drop in the city's homicide rate. Now this seemingly simple idea - federalizing firearms cases - is scrambling alliances in the national gun-control debate. Mr. Schiller's campaign, dubbed Project Exile, is backed by both the National Rifle Association and some ardent gun-control advocates, including a few big-city mayors. Congress wants to implement Project Exile in other cities, but the Clinton administration is loath to divert money and attention from its antigun initiatives to one backed by its nemesis, the NRA.

The battle over Project Exile heats up when Congress returns from its summer recess to finish work on next year's budget. Supporters will lobby hard for more money, and some Republicans see a chance to embarrass the president if the administration opposes a get-tough solution on one of Mr. Clinton's pet issues. A career prosecutor, the 43-year-old Mr. Schiller didn't mean to get in the middle of a political storm, but his relentless evangelizing has made him a minicelebrity here and a thorn in the side of Justice Department officials in Washington.

SOME PEOPLE THINK SCHILLER'S NUTS

"Some people think Schiller's nuts," says Richmond defense attorney David Boone. "Is he overzealous? Absolutely, but he's like the Lone Ranger: He's on a mission." (Like the missionary who brought the Inquisition to the Indians. WFI Editor) For years, Congress has been expanding the reach of federal gun laws, making it relatively easy to bring these cases. But few prosecutors took the bait until Mr. Schiller started using the little-noticed laws to prosecute not only well-armed drug dealers, but middle-aged wife-beaters who happen to keep a gun in the closet. The mandatory federal sentences are stiffer than those generally given in state courts. (And today, the United States has more of its own nationals in prison and jail than any other country on the Earth. WFI Editor)

Has it made a difference? Throughout the 1990s, Richmond was one of the country's most violent cities, but now things are improving. There have been 39 gun-related homicides in Richmond so far this year, 49 fewer than last year at this time. Violent crime has been falling nationwide, but Mr. Schiller claims to be altering criminal behavior on the street. "What we're finding is a that a lot of dopers are now being arrested without any guns on them," he says. Mr. Schiller and his boss, U.S. Attorney Helen Fahey, have gone to Washington repeatedly to plead with senior Justice Department officials for more prosecutors and agents, but with little success. "We could do more cases if we had more help," says Ms. Fahey, a Clinton appointee.

Kent Markus, Attorney General Janet Reno's top aide on gun violence until leaving last month (July) to teach law, dismisses Project Exile as "assembly line" prosecutions that bleed resources from other law-enforcement priorities, such as organized crime and high-level drug trafficking. "I don't think there's any empirical evidence" that Richmond's falling murder rate is related to Project Exile, says Mr. Markus.

Richmond officials applaud Mr. Schiller's efforts, but worry about the long-term social consequences of such draconian measures. "There's got to be solutions other than Exile," said Police Chief Jerry Oliver, a supporter of the program. "As an African-American male I'm dismayed at what we have to do to maintain safety." The NRA embraced Project Exile as the embodiment of its anti-gun control doctrine: Get tough on crime, not guns. "It says with deadly accuracy that guns are for the law-abiding," asserts NRA Executive Director Wayne LaPierre, who is lobbying lawmakers to expand the program to dozens of cities. "That hasn't been said anywhere else in the country, and it is changing criminal behavior in Richmond."

Mr. Schiller disagrees with the NRA on gun control and worries that its backing for his program could overshadow its accomplishment. But the group's support was key to getting the program off the ground. At first, Richmond's conservative business community was lukewarm about it, Mr. Schiller says, because of early NRA hostility. When he asked for an endorsement, he says the NRA denounced him as an antigun zealot from the "Clinton-Reno empire." A subsequent appeal through a friend of a friend of Mr. Schiller's brought a closer look from Mr. LaPierre. Since then, the NRA has spent more than $25,000 promoting the program, including a sizeable gift to a nonprofit foundation that publicizes Project Exile's harsh consequences on radio, television and billboards. For balance, Mr. Schiller also sought out Handgun Control Inc., whose chairwoman, Sarah Brady, called Project Exile's results "impressive," though not a panacea.

Other odd alliances are forming as well. In June, NRA President Charlton Heston joined forces with Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell, a pro-gun control Democrat, to seek Project Exile funding for his city. But the Philadelphia U.S. Attorney's office worries that trying Project Exile in a city with seven times more people than Richmond is impractical and might swamp the courts. Nevertheless, last month the Senate approved an amendment by Pennsylvania Republican Arlen Specter requiring the Justice Department to spend $1.5 million on five prosecutors and 10 investigators to prosecute gun cases in Philadelphia, which averages over 400 murders a year. New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg, a pro-gun control Democrat, secured $800,000 for a similar effort in nearby Camden.

The NRA bought a full-page ad in USA Today earlier this month, prodding President Clinton to support the Philadelphia appropriation: "Instead of giving us another press conference about more gun control laws," it said, "give us one city. Let us try crime fighting our way - the Project Exile way." The ad annoyed Mr. Rendell, whose White House lobbying efforts received a polite but noncommittal response. Still, he says, "If it stops only six murders a year, I've got to be for it… The White House may distrust the NRA, but I've got to overlook that."

In Richmond, Mr. Schiller works on a shoestring. He has merchants pass out black cards warning, "An illegal gun gets you 5 years in federal prison." He hands out laminated cards to the police explaining the basics of federal gun statutes. For example, it's a federal crime to carry a weapon while possessing illegal drugs. "Most suspects will deny dealing but readily admit using," the card reads. "That's all we need to make a federal gun case." (And when you recall that drug prohibition essentially constitutes a political crime, you can see the police state implications of a wholesale campaign to imprison drug users because they may carry a firearm. WFI Editor)

Just ask Shuler Cox, 19 years old. He was arrested with a small amount of crack cocaine and marijuana - and a .45 caliber semiautomatic in his car. A federal jury convicted him of drug and gun charges. Now, despite an otherwise clean record, he's facing seven years in a federal penitentiary. "When I turned 17, I got into the drug scene, and I just thought that having a weapon by my side wouldn't let nobody get to me," explains Mr. Cox, who nevertheless claims the gun wasn't his and is appealing. (Of course, if the drugs were legal, then the trade in drugs would not require the protection of firearms, but instead would be protected by the police, like all lawful trade is today. You don't hear about cases where liquor store owners require guns, drive-by shootings over alcohol stopped with the repeal of Prohibition. WFI Editor)

On the other hand, some dangerous offenders are now off the streets. Melvin "Bug" Smith, a 22-year-old member of a gang called the "Bottom Group," was pulled over on a routine traffic stop and ended up getting 16 years for drug and firearm convictions. Once he was behind bars, witnesses came forward and implicated him in five murders. He was indicted on those charges by state prosecutors earlier this month.

SOURCE: Excerpted from the 31 August, 1998, issue of the Wall Street Journal, West Coast Edition, entitled "Prosecutor's Strategy Scrambles Gun-Control Alliances." Excerpted in the public service of the national interest of the American people.