MARYSVILLE — A Marysville mom is in hot water after allegedly keeping for herself a military-style rifle her teenage son is accused of stealing in a July burglary.
The allegations are outlined in a North Snohomish County Property Crime Unit police report. The report was obtained under state open records laws.
The investigation turned up cellphone photos of two teens posing with a stolen AR-15 and a stolen handgun. In another picture, the mother stands in the background as her son points the handgun toward the cellphone camera. There is a separate photo in which she is seen wearing a yellow dress and smiling while holding the rifle.
Both teens were charged in Snohomish County Juvenile Court with possessing stolen property. The mother, 31, was booked into the Snohomish County Jail for investigation of possessing a stolen firearm. She later was released, pending charges.
The Herald generally doesn’t identify juveniles charged with crimes. Naming the mother likely would identify her son.
The investigation began in the early morning of July 10 when the teens were found sleeping on a bridge along a trail in Marysville. The woman’s son, 16, reportedly had a handgun beneath him. The serial number had been filed off, but the weapon matched the description of a handgun reported stolen from a Marysville home the day before.
The burglary victim discovered that someone had used a Japanese-style sword to break into his weapons safe. He came home to find a rifle had been removed from the safe and left in the living room. Taken in the burglary was the AR-15, a handgun, a video game, a wedding ring, roughly $500 in cash and a pair of sunglasses.
After police recovered the missing handgun from the teen, the victim told detectives he went to the Facebook page of the 16-year-old, who lives nearby. A neighbor recognized the teen hanging out by the home the day of the burglary.
The teen had changed his Facebook profile photo. The burglary victim told police it appeared from the photo that the teen was wearing his stolen sunglasses and was holding his stolen handgun.
When questioned about the burglary and specifically about the rifle, the 16-year-old “stated that it was complicated and it would get him in trouble if he told me,” a detective wrote.
When police first went to the boy’s home, his mother gave permission for them to search his room. Inside the room, they found two AR-15 magazines but not the rifle. They also found the sun glasses and video game.
The woman allowed police to search other parts of the house, but “never allowed us to search her bedroom,” detectives wrote in an affidavit for a search warrant.
Later, during an interview, the other boy — a 15-year-old runaway — told police that his friend’s mom “saw the AR-15 in the room and she wanted it for herself.” He also said that they’d taken photos that could be found on their cellphones. Police obtained a search warrant and discovered the photo of the mom holding the rifle among the many images.
They returned to the home where they found the rifle on a shelf in her locked closet.
The mom had kept hand-written notes after her son’s arrest.
In one excerpt, she wrote that police showed her a picture of the AR-15.
She didn’t mention that she had it in her closet until after police learned about her involvement in concealing its location for four days, according to the police report.
When confronted by police about her involvement, the mom allegedly admitted that she had the rifle and was trying to figure out a way to return it to its owner.
Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446; stevick@heraldnet.com.
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