Burglary While Armed Brings Over Five Years in Prison

SPOKANE—Today, Michael C. Ormsby, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Washington, announced that Anthony J. Mathias, age 21 of Nespelem, Washington, was sentenced today to serve a 66-month prison term for a residential burglary and possession of a firearm during that burglary committed on the Colville Indian Reservation. A jury found Anthony Mathias guilty of the burglary on June 14, 2011, but could not reach a verdict on the firearm charge. Mathias entered a guilty plea to the firearm charge on July 26, 2011.

In the early morning hours of June 26, 2010, two young men pulled up in front of a house in Tribal housing near the Colville Indian Agency campus outside of Nespelem, Washington and started an altercation with another man. The two individuals left the altercation in a truck, but returned a short time later with Anthony Mathias and three other men. Mathias then kicked in the door to the house where the other participant in the altercation and witnesses had gathered. Mathias and two other men began yelling at the occupants of the house. Mathias pointed the gun at those occupants of the house and then fired one bullet into the floor. He and the other men then fled. Anthony Mathias is an enrolled member of the Salish-Kootenai Tribe of the Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana.

Michael C. Ormsby, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Washington, said, “Gun violence on the Indian reservations has become all too common. My office is committed to reducing the violence on Indian reservations within this district.”

This investigation was conducted by the Colville Tribal Police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. This case was prosecuted by Rudy Verschoor, Assistant United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Washington.

11-CR-024-JLQ