Illegal Weapons, Explosives Found in Doctor’s Yard

Investigators said Monday they discovered illegal automatic weapons among a small arsenal of guns, ammunition and illegal explosives retrieved over the weekend from the side yard of Irvine biomedical researcher Dr. Larry C. Ford.

Some of the weapons found in six buried canisters were decades old, in keeping with Ford’s family’s assertions that he was an avid gun collector. But others were of more recent issue, and the seized ammunition included two boxes holding nearly 50 incendiary cartridges, most of them 5.56-millimeter rounds, Irvine police said.

“Those are rounds that are coated with a tip of phosphorous, so when it hits an object it ignites and creates a fire,” said Irvine police Lt. Sam Allevato. “They’re used by the military. It’s illegal to possess them.”

In another development late Monday, police searched an Irvine storage facility rented to Biofem Inc., which was co-owned by Ford. The unit at Irvine Mini-Storage on Kelvin Avenue contained bottles that appeared to hold common chemicals and pharmaceuticals used in research, police spokesman Sgt. Wallace Prestidge said.

Investigators worked into the night examining the contents of the unit, he said, to determine if any of the material was hazardous.

Details of the cache came as an Orange County Grand Jury continues to probe the shooting on Feb. 28 of James Patrick Riley, Ford’s business partner in Biofem, followed by Ford’s apparent suicide three days later. Police have arrested the alleged driver of the van in which an unidentified gunman fled after shooting Riley outside Biofem’s Irvine Spectrum office.

Police said they believe that money was behind the attack on Riley, but two weeks later they still don’t have a clear understanding of the motives surrounding the botched hit or Ford’s suicide on March 2.

So far, the grand jury has called Ford’s lawyer, Stephen Klarich, who spoke with Ford for several hours before the suicide, and members of Ford’s family. Klarich refused to testify, citing attorney-client privilege. Ford’s son, Larry C. Ford Jr., declined to discuss his testimony.

The Orange County district attorney’s office, citing the confidential nature of the grand jury proceedings, declined comment Monday. But legal observers said it was highly unusual that prosecutors would turn to a grand jury this early in a police investigation.

Karen R. Smith, a professor at the Southwestern University School of Law in Los Angeles, said grand jury investigations are a tool often used by prosecutors in sensitive cases.

“It helps overcome witness reluctance,” she said.

Witnesses in criminal investigations are not obligated to answer questions posed by police, but a grand jury subpoena legally compels them to testify. Such witnesses are not represented by an attorney, but can invoke their 5th Amendment right against self-incrimination.

Allevato said prosecutors turned to the grand jury to try to compel witnesses to cooperate with the investigation.

“Some people are afraid, and some want assurances of immunity, and some want what they say to be held in confidence,” he said. “All the testimony that they give will be confidential.”

Meanwhile, police said again that they have warned an unspecified number of Ford’s friends and former business associates to be on guard against possible assaults.

“It’s just a precaution,” Allevato said.

Ford worked as an advisor to the South African Defense Forces’ apartheid-era program to develop biological and chemical weapons, according to sources involved in the program.

Investigators who searched Ford’s home on Foxboro found jars of suspected biological materials, which have been sent to the FBI’s crime lab in Washington. Results of the preliminary tests should be available today, Allevato said.