Felon arrested after allegedly seen hiding stolen gun

A Mount Ida man with previous felony convictions was arrested Tuesday morning on warrants alleging he was observed hiding what turned out to be a stolen rifle following a disturbance.

Johnny Ray Atwood, 28, of Mount Ida’s City Streets, was arrested at Garland County District Court around 9:45 a.m. He was serving warrants for possession of a firearm by certain persons and receiving stolen firearms. Both warrants are punishable by up to six years in prison.

Atwood was initially held on $50,000 bail, but after he pleaded not guilty in District Court on Wednesday, his bail was reduced to $25,000. He remained in custody Thursday, with a felony review hearing scheduled for Sept. 6.

According to court records, Atwood was convicted in Montgomery County in 2014 of simultaneous possession of drugs and firearms, possession of marijuana with intent to resell and possession of drug paraphernalia and sentenced to three years probation. In 2016, he was sentenced to seven years in prison in Johnson County for resale of meth.

According to the probable cause affidavit, Hot Springs police were in the area of ​​Burchwood Mobile Home Park Rentals, 220 Burchwood Bay Road, on June 27 for a trespassing incident.

While officers were on the other side of the trailer park, several 911 calls came in about a “suspicious male” with a rifle near one of the trailers. Additional officers arrived at the scene, but before they arrived, the man reportedly wrapped the rifle in a blanket or sheet and placed it on a nearby trailer before walking into one of the trailers.

Officers interviewed several witnesses who reportedly gave corroborating statements describing a man, later identified as Atwood, wearing a ski mask while waving a rifle on the RV’s porch.

The affidavit states that at one point Atwood apparently waved the gun toward police officers on the other side of the park “as if to taunt or threaten them.”

Officers made contact with a woman in the trailer Atwood allegedly entered. She identified herself as Atwood’s sister. She said he was gathering items stored near her residence because he was in the process of moving to Mount Ida.

When asked about Atwood’s current whereabouts, she reportedly gave “conflicting information.” No one from the house would pick up the gun from its alleged location, which was “in a public park accessible to all park residents.”

Because the rifle was located “on a trailer in the common area” near which “several young youths were playing,” officers seized the weapon “for safekeeping.” The rifle, a Bushmaster Carbon 15 “AR-Style” rifle loaded with one round, had been reported stolen in Sheridan in 2017.

After further investigation, an arrest warrant was issued for Atwood on July 2 on both charges.