Defendant in Mass. Army Reserve gun theft reaches plea deal

By Chris Eger

James Morales, a former Army reservist, entered a plea agreement to the theft of six M4 Carbines and 10 M11 handguns (Photo: Mass Live)
A man who swiped more than a dozen weapons from a U.S. Army Reserve Center in Worcester, Massachusetts, accepted a guilty plea to all charges against him, according to recently filed court documents.
James Walker Morales, 35, signed a plea agreement for the theft of 16 weapons — six M-4 Carbines and 10 M-11 semi-automatic handguns — from the Lincoln W. Stoddard U.S. Army Reserve Center armory in 2015. Prosecutors recommended that the court sentence Morales, a former Army reservist, to 14 years in prison followed by three years supervised release.
Investigators tied Morales to the theft using a combination of DNA evidence recovered at the scene, surveillance footage of the suspect and his car, and the fact that Morales was wearing a court-ordered monitoring bracelet that, placed him directly inside the facility during the burglary, according to court documents. At the time, he faced child-rape charges.
Morales had visited the Stoddard center two days before the theft during business hours to obtain copies of his discharge papers.  He had enlisted in the reserve in September 2008 and served until

Source: Guns.com