Co-owner of white power record label arrested on drug charge

Associated Press/December 1, 2004

Hastings, Minn. -- The Minnesota Gang Strike Force arrested one of the co-owners of a white power record label early Tuesday on suspicion of felony possession of a small amount of a substance believed to be cocaine.

Anthony A. Pierpont, 38, was arrested in his home in South St. Paul early Tuesday, police said. He was being held in the Dakota County jail in Hastings on Wednesday. He had not been formally charged.

Pierpont runs Panzerfaust Records, which he founded in 1998, with his partner Byron Calvert. A telephone call from The Associated Press to Panzerfaust was not immediately returned Wednesday.

The company was in the news last fall after announcing that it was creating 100,000 copies of a "pro-white sample CD" for distribution to children in a campaign dubbed Project Schoolyad USA. A panzerfaust was a World War II-era German anti-tank weapon.

Pierpont is listed as one of "40 to Watch" among "radical right activists," according to the Web site of The Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights group based in Alabama.

Ron Ryan, commander from the strike force, said hate groups meet the definition of a gang because members are often associated with criminal activity.

"Anybody 'white power' or those types of groups have been classified as gangs," he said.

Investigator Dan Michener said the search of Pierpont's house found Nazi flags, skinhead music and racist T-shirts. He said they also found manuals on homemade explosives.

A spokeswoman for Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom said a decision on charges would be made by Thursday afternoon.