Alaska State Troopers last week charged a 23-year-old Haines resident with three felonies related to a June burglary and theft at Southeast Road Builders.
According to court documents, the man allegedly stole about $1,300 in paintball guns, shotgun ammunition and a battery charger from a company warehouse near 5 Mile Haines Highway.
Three months after stealing the items, the 23-year-old reported the same paintball guns were stolen from his trailer by an “associate.” During the investigation, the man admitted to trooper Ken VanSpronsen the property had been taken from him as collateral for a drug debt.
Troopers contacted the suspect in October when he was driving a stolen ATV along the Haines Highway and soon confronted him about the Southeast Road Builders theft. The man claimed he only stole gasoline from the site, but was present when a 14-year-old took the paintball guns and some fireworks. He admitted to keeping the paintball guns at his trailer.
The man, currently at Lemon Creek Correctional Center, faces more than a dozen felony and misdemeanor charges stemming from four recent run-ins with the law. He is also charged with illegally shooting a sow and two cubs in August, stealing an ATV from a gravel pit in October and burglarizing a Comstock Road residence in November.