Two sailors charged in Navy weapons theft

VIRGINIA BEACH

Navy investigators are looking into the theft of four assault rifles and a handgun from an office at Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base, according to a search warrant affidavit.

Two sailors have been charged, the Navy said Tuesday.

The affidavit, dated April 10 and filed Monday in Virginia Beach Circuit Court, was submitted by a Naval Criminal Investigative Service agent. It named four sailors in the incident, which occurred in mid-February. They were members of Assault Craft Unit Two.

The sailors gave four of the guns to family members out of state, the document said, and three of those weapons have been recovered. The search warrant allowed investigators to search a storage facility on Haden Road, where they suspect at least one of the M-16 assault rifles was stored.

Lt. John Fage, a spokesman for Expeditionary Strike Group Two, said the weapons went missing after they had been removed from a landing craft vessel but before being transferred into the unit’s armory.

The landing craft had recently returned from a six-month deployment, Fage said, and was about to enter the shipyard for some maintenance, so the weapons had to be removed.

He called the incident “an isolated case.” He said investigators will work to determine whether any other sailors violated protocol in storing the weapons.

NCIS began investigating the missing weapons on Feb. 27, after the unit’s acting executive officer reported that an inventory of assigned weapons failed to account for a Beretta 9 mm pistol and four M-16s. The guns were worth an estimated $2,100.

One of the sailors – Petty Officer 3rd Class Devin A. Stoops – agreed to make a deal in return for his testimony, according to the affidavit. He told NCIS that he and two fellow sailors were drinking when they decided to go into the gunner’s mate’s office “to see what was in there.”

Stoops told the agents that Petty Officer 3rd Class Aaron J. Moore served as the lookout, while he climbed over a partial wall and unlocked the door to the office, which Seaman Recruit Bryan Schmitz entered.

There, the document said, the sailors found “numerous weapons located within an unsecured blue box” and took the handgun and M-16s. They divided the weapons among themselves as well as Petty Officer 3rd Class Marques L. Carter and Jeremy K. Robinson, a civilian, the document said. Stoops and Schmitz have been charged, the Navy said.

The affidavit stated that the handgun and one M-16 were later recovered from Stoops’ cousin’s house in Middle River, Md. Carter and Robinson allegedly took two guns to Carter’s brother’s house in Miami. During a wire tapped conversation, Carter’s brother said he had sold one M-16. A search of the Miami residence turned up a second one as well as numerous rounds, marijuana and cocaine, the document said.

Carter told agents that the other guns may have been held in a storage unit Schmitz used.