A former staff sergeant at Fairchild Air Force Base will not spend more time in jail after being indicted as part of a plot, headed by an airman who expressed antigovernment sentiment online, to steal ammunition and an optic sight for a firearm.
Jonah Pierce pleaded guilty in April to a single misdemeanor charge of receipt of stolen government property. He’d received a red dot optic sight for a firearm that he told U.S. District Court Judge Thomas O. Rice had been slated for destruction. Pierce, who was not in custody and appeared in a shirt and tie, asked the judge not to send him to jail for what he said was “part of the culture” at the base and in the military. He believed he could take the defective optic home and “fix it,” he said.
“I am remorsely sorry for what I’ve done,” said Pierce, who noted that he is the only source of income for his wife, a disabled military veteran, and family. He has been separated from the Air Force and had to move off-base after the indictment, according to court records.
Federal prosecutors had asked that Pierce receive a six-month sentence, the same handed down by Rice to Eric Eagleton last month. Eagleton pleaded guilty to a felony charge of possession of stolen ammunition.
“The conduct of the defendant was egregious,” said Patrick Cashman, the assistant U.S. attorney handling the case. “It’s serious. It also hurt the image of the Air Force.”
Bryan Whitaker, Pierce’s…