Documents Show Child-Rape Suspect Had Huge Arsenal Agents Found Machine Guns, Grenades, Silencers, Bombs

Court documents unsealed Wednesday reveal that a Spokane man accused of raping nine children possessed what one federal investigator called an unbelievable arsenal.

The arsenal, stored at three locations in the Spokane area, included machine guns, grenades coated with poisonous shrapnel, assembled pipe bombs, homemade explosives and an estimated 100,000 rounds of ammunition.

Investigators also found briefcases containing a handgun, a holster, a silencer, ammunition clips and latex gloves, the court documents show.

One investigator said the briefcases appeared to be assassination kits.

The man accused of collecting and hiding the illegal arsenal, Gregory L. McCrea, is scheduled to appear today in U.S. District Court.

Associates say McCrea has ties to others with anti-government and militia views.

He is scheduled to be arraigned on a federal firearms charge as the first step in a complicated plea agreement.

In state court, McCrea faces 11 counts of first-degree child rape and one count of sexual exploitation of a child.

He is expected to appear in Superior Court next week to enter pleas to some of those state charges as part of the plea agreement put together by his attorneys and state and federal prosecutors.

Details of the plea agreement haven’t been made public.

The arsenal was seized on May 8, 1998, from McCrea’s home at 1401 E. Bridgeport and from two converted railroad box cars he owns at 512 N. Perry.

Those searches led authorities on May 12, 1998, to a locker McCrea rented under another name at Shurguard Storage, 12420 E. Sprague.

Agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms had to rent a large U-Haul truck to haul away the weapons.

“It’s an unbelievable arsenal,” said ATF agent Doug Farmer, who is assigned the case.

“We’ve seen nothing close to it in sheer number and firepower,” Spokane ATF station chief Brad Farnsworth said.

McCrea was arrested after his friends, who are the parents of a 6-year-old girl, told police their daughter had been sexually molested.

The friends and the suspect’s other associates told investigators of McCrea’s interest in firearms and explosives. He legally couldn’t possess either because he was convicted in 1977 of possessing a pipe bomb.

In the search of McCrea’s house, police and ATF agents found a fully equipped machine shop where he made various gun parts and rebuilt destroyed firearms he bought as scrap metal.

Investigators also found a basement room in McCrea’s home where explosive powders were stored.

The chemicals, including potassium chlorate, aluminum powder, barium nitrate and potassium nitrate, were used to make flash powder, Farmer said.

Agents also found several explosive devices made with flash powder.

“Flash powder in quantity has the same detonating velocity as TNT,” Farmer said. “It’s an explosive powder, classified as a high-explosive.”

The last ATF agent killed in the line of duty died near Seattle about five years ago while handling illegally made flash powder.

In McCrea’s home, officers also found an AR-15 assault rifle. The firearm had an obliterated serial number, was illegally converted to full automatic and was fitted with an illegal silencer.

Agents found at least two dozen machine guns in McCrea’s two railroad boxcars. They also seized a 20mm cannon, a grenade launcher and shotguns and rifles with illegally shortened barrels.

The receiver for a multiple-barrel, 20mm Gatling gun - like the type attached to gunships during the Vietnam War - also was seized.

Those searches led them four days later to search the Spokane Valley storage facility that McCrea rented, using the name Susan Mercer.

In the storage room, agents seized 56 hand grenades and three rocket-propelled grenades that could be fired from launch tubes or with specially equipped rifles.

“The first bag we opened contained three fully armed improvised devices, with their ignition pins protruding,” Farmer said.

The search also turned up 28 pounds of a homemade, slurry-like, high explosive, made from aluminum powder and other ingredients.

This sidebar appeared with the story: NEXT Gregory L. McCrea is scheduled to be arraigned on a federal firearms charge as the first step in a complicated plea agreement today in U.S. District Court.