Crump, Adams Found Guilty

Guilty.

That’s the verdict handed down to two Toccoa men charged in a plot to produce ricin and attack the U.S. government by a jury in U.S. District Court Friday in Gainesville on multiple counts.

Samuel J. Crump and Ray H. Adams, both of Toccoa, were each found guilty on one count of Conspiracy to Possess and Produce a Biological Toxin For Use as a Weapon and Possession of a Biologicial Toxin For Use as a Weapon. 

Adams was found not guilty on a third charge of Attempted Possession of a Biological Toxin, Ricin, For Use as a Weapon.

The Associated Press reports that the jury reached its verdict after deliberating for about 90 minutes.

The verdict concludes what was a nearly two week long trial in federal court in front of U.S. District Court Judge Richard Story.

Federal prosecutors say that Crump and Adams plotted to make ricin and had actually steps towards making the toxin.

Meanwhile, defense attorneys argued during the trial that the men were just talking and had no intentions of carrying out an attack.

Crump and Adams were arrested back in November 2011 in connection with this case, along with Dan Roberts of Toccoa and Frederick Thomas of Cleveland.

Previously in April 2012, Roberts and Thomas each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to obtain an unregistered explosive device and silencer in connection with the case and were sentenced to five years in federal prison later that same year.