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Leads on gun stolen from ATF storefront in Milwaukee fizzled out

Questions continue about Fearless Distributing sting

April 03, 2013

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By John Diedrich and Raquel Rutledge of the Journal Sentinel

April 03, 2013 0

Hours after a machine gun was stolen from an ATF agent's vehicle in September, police had four men in custody - one who admitted holding the fully automatic weapon before his friend took it back and stashed it under a bed in a north side house.

But as police and federal agents fanned out searching houses and interviewing family members, friends and girlfriends, the gun vanished.

More than six months later, the rifle and another gun stolen along with it remain missing.

And despite a newly filed search warrant detailing a text message that may link one of the original suspects to the theft, nobody has been charged with the crime.

Of all the mistakes by the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in its flawed gun-buying sting in Milwaukee last year, the loss of the government-owned Colt M4 stands as the gravest threat to public safety.

"Everyone is on pins and needles every day that this gun is going to be used out there," said a police officer familiar with the investigation, who asked not to be identified.

Police reports on the theft and the search warrant detail the hunt for the stolen guns in the hours immediately following the break-in. Records show agents and police following a hot trail, hitting the house where the machine gun was reportedly hidden and finding ammunition that had been stolen along with the gun - a good indication they were close.

The documents and the timeline raise questions about whether efforts to get the guns were hampered by a desire to preserve the storefront operation and keep an embarrassing episode quiet.

Besides losing the guns, the operation was plagued by other foul-ups, a Journal Sentinel investigation found: The ATF storefront - called Fearless Distributing - was burglarized of what agents reported was nearly $40,000 in merchandise, an ATF ballistic shield was lost, and at least three of the wrong suspects were charged, including one who was in prison at the time.

In addition, agents left behind sensitive documents, damaged the building and ran up utility bills, then refused to pay the landlord and warned him against pursuing the matter.

In the wake of the Journal Sentinel investigation, a bipartisan group of powerful congressional members termed the sting a "failed operation" that put a residential area at risk. On Wednesday, four lawmakers sent another letter to acting ATF Director B. Todd Jones, demanding answers by next week.

The ATF launched an internal investigation into the operation and forwarded it to the Justice Department for review. It is expected to be completed soon. An ATF spokeswoman said there would be no comment on the Milwaukee operation until that investigation is released.

The Department of Justice's inspector general is considering his own independent examination into the operation, concerned about the lack of oversight so soon after the agency's flawed "Fast and Furious" case.

In that operation, agents monitored the sale of more than 2,000 guns to gun traffickers but lost track of them, with many of the weapons ending up at crime scenes including the one where a U.S. border guard was killed.

In Milwaukee, the plan was to buy illegal guns and take them off the street.

About 30 people have been charged, but mostly on minor gun and drug counts; 145 guns were seized, but some had just been purchased from stores such as Gander Mountain and sold to undercover agents for a quick profit.

This time, when agents lost track of weapons, they were their own.

Theft from agent's SUV

Three guns were stolen from an ATF agent's SUV last September, about nine months after the storefront operation, called Fearless Distributing, opened on E. Meinecke Ave. in the Riverwest neighborhood.

The agent's Ford Explorer was parked in a lot beside Alterra Coffee on N. Humboldt Blvd. - a half-mile from the storefront, according to police reports. A witness saw a car with three men inside pull up shortly after 3 p.m. The suspects broke into the SUV, pried open a locked metal box, taking a rifle and two handguns - a Smith & Wesson semiautomatic 9mm pistol and a Sig Sauer semiautomatic .40-caliber pistol. They also stole an ATF radio and ammunition.

ATF agents were the first on the scene, but they quickly called Milwaukee police for help.

The guns were on the move.

Shortly after the break-in, police reports say, Arzell Chison received a call from a friend, Brandon Toombs, telling him he had something to show him. Toombs, who had two earlier convictions for theft, wouldn't tell Chison what it was over the phone.

Chison, himself on probation for theft, went to a house near N. 24th and W. Locust streets. Toombs and another man, Xavier Boone, 24, were there.

Chison, 20, went into the kitchen and saw three guns on the table- 9mm and .40-caliber handguns and a "military looking rifle," the report says.

Chison would later tell police Toombs, 21, showed him several boxes of ammunition and eight magazines loaded with bullets.

Toombs told Chison he and the others stole the guns on the east side, but he wouldn't give any other details.

Toombs then slid the rifle under a bed, put the stolen Smith & Wesson pistol in the console between the front seats of his car and slid the Sig Sauer into his pocket, the report says.

While this scene was unfolding, investigators back at the scene of the car break-in were coming up empty on evidence from the burglarized vehicle. No traceable fingerprints were found.

The investigation turned to old-fashioned police work. Seasoned police officers from various units in the department, all with contacts across the north side, joined the search. Milwaukee police officers worked their sources, getting leads on where the gun might be, according to sources familiar with the investigation.

Officers caught a break when they spotted a black Chevy parked near N. 21st and W. Locust streets matching the description of one seen near the coffee shop where the ATF vehicle was broken into.

Police then saw Boone, Toombs, Chison and a 17-year-old youth approach the car and took them into custody on suspicion of the theft.

In the car, officers found four GPS units and other items that matched those stolen in car break-ins earlier that day elsewhere in the Riverwest area.

They didn't find what they were after - the stolen guns.

Suspects didn't cooperate

The suspects were taken to police headquarters. Toombs refused to talk to detectives. There is no indication in the reports if Boone or the juvenile said anything.

But the police reports show Chison was talking.

At first, he said he knew nothing about the stolen guns. When a detective told Chison he would be charged in the theft of the guns, he changed his story.

Chison described how he saw the guns, including the rifle, before Toombs stashed it under the bed. Chison told the detective they might find his fingerprints on the weapon.

But Chison refused to cooperate with prosecutors.

Without that, Toombs and Boone could not be charged, according to Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm.

"There is no physical evidence and no weapon recovered," he said. "There is nothing else directly connecting those individuals (Boone and Toombs) to the stolen items other than the eyewitness. Without his cooperation, we don't have a case."

ATF agents were soon at the house where Chison said he had seen the machine gun. Someone at the house let agents search without a warrant. Agents found the boxes of ATF ammunition but no gun.

Fingerprints on the ammunition boxes matched those of a felon named Markeevin Wilder. The 25-year-old, with a 2006 armed robbery conviction, was arrested and charged. He has pleaded guilty in federal court.

The ATF soon got one of the stolen guns back.

The day after the theft, Sept. 14, Marquise Jones sold the ATF its own gun, along with a second, for $1,400 at the Fearless Distributing store, according to court documents.

But ATF agents let Jones walk. It would be about a week before agents questioned him, according to sources familiar with the investigation who asked not to be identified.

The sources said Jones was allowed to leave because ATF officials worried an arrest would expose the undercover storefront operation and embarrass the agency. Court records show agents continued to buy guns at the Fearless storefront in the week after the agent's guns were stolen.

The operation was shut down a short time later. It is unclear if the decision was made by ATF or the U.S. attorney's office in Milwaukee, which had been briefed on the investigation.

Jones might have been the best shot investigators had at quickly retrieving the remaining stolen guns.

Two months later, he was charged in federal court. He has pleaded guilty to possessing a stolen gun and is awaiting sentencing.

Toombs and Boone, who were arrested on the theft and later released, have been charged with other crimes in recent months, unrelated to the Fearless operation.

Contacted earlier this year, before he was arrested in those cases, Toombs told the Journal Sentinel he didn't steal the ATF guns and didn't know who did.

"I'm not going to talk about that," he said. "I am putting that behind me."

Toombs' attorney did not return a call for comment this week. Boone could not be reached for comment. His attorney also declined to comment.

The missing machine gun was mentioned in a search warrant filed March 18 in a different case.

In that case, Willtoniette Johnson is suspected of burning a car related to a fight with Boone, her boyfriend.

Johnson declined to comment this week when contacted by the Journal Sentinel.

The warrant says Boone is still a suspect in the theft of the ATF machine gun.

It also shows Johnson sent at least one text message related to the case:

"Have x hml asap its about the atf nbs." A detective translated that to mean: "Have Xavier hit my line as soon as possible. It's about the ATF, no bull (expletive)."

Ashley Luthern of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.

About John Diedrich

John Diedrich writes about crime, federal issues, ultimate fighting and guns. His investigations have been honored with various national awards including a George Polk Award for reporting on rogue gun stores and an IRE award for exposing botched undercover federal stings.

About Raquel Rutledge

Raquel Rutledge is an investigative reporter. Her work has been recognized with numerous national awards, including a 2010 Pulitzer Prize for exposing rampant fraud in Wisconsin's child-care subsidy program.