Two more arrested in MTA theft

PALMER — Though the ship was loaded with state legislators on the way to Juneau, it was two other passengers who got the most attention.

Juneau police, working with their colleagues in Palmer, agreed to meet the ferry Tustumena at the dock.

According to a Juneau Police Department press release, at high noon on Saturday officers went to the ship and arrested Robert Stevens, 43, of Oregon, and Robert Ristick, 40, of Washington, both on $100,000 warrants.

The Juneau press release is decidedly brief. To get to the heart of why Stevens and Ristick were arrested, you have to talk to Palmer Police Department Detective Sgt. Kelly Turney.

Turney said the two men were tied up in a case that has been occupying most of his time over the past week — the theft of $114,500 in copper wire from the Matanuska Telephone Association in Palmer.

Turney said Ristick, Stevens, and a third man, Jeff Davis, had been traveling around the state buying scrap metal. Davis is still at large, Turney said. He also said he didn’t know if Davis was still in Alaska.

“He didn’t get on the boat with them in Kodiak,” Turney said.

Turney believes that before and after the theft in Palmer, the three men were traveling around the state looking for scrap. He said he knew they’d been to Fairbanks, North Pole, Kodiak, Valdez and Anchorage.

“I know they’ve been in those areas. Now, I’m not saying that every time they’ve gone out they have purchased scrap illegally,” Turney said.

And, he said, his main focus is to nail down all the details of the theft in Palmer, although that doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot of work to do.

“You just want to make sure you cover all the bases so you give a good case (to the district attorney),” Turney said.

The arrest of Stevens and Ristick brings the total number of arrests in the case to three.

The first person arrested, Howard Tresham, is a 25-year employee of MTA. Police say they have charged him with the current theft and with a previous one in December.

The current theft saw eight reels of heavy-duty cable — about 30,000 feet worth — go missing from the lot. It was recovered in Anchorage where it was due to be shipped out of state. The December theft involved half that much material, which hasn’t been recovered.

Turney said the eight reels of wire went missing Jan. 9. The driver who’d been called to pick up the cable in Palmer and take it to Anchorage picked Tresham out of a group of photos as the person who had let him into the lot that day.

The plan, as far as police can discern it, was to ship the cable to Washington, then sell it as scrap. Turney said he recovered most of the $5,000 that Tresham was paid for the cable.

As for the arrests in Juneau, Turney said he wouldn’t have been able to do it without help from the various agencies around the state. He said he would call officers at the relevant departments and within five minutes someone would be out on the streets, asking questions and relaying the information back to him.

Juneau, he said, called in an investigator to interview Ristick and Stevens even though it was a weekend.

“I can’t thank Juneau PD and Kodiak PD, the (Alaska State) Troopers and state ferry officials enough,” Turney said. “I can’t be all of those places.”

As for who else was on the ferry, Turney confirmed the Tustumena was bringing a load of state legislators and their vehicles to the capitol for the start of this year’s legislative session. Of course, that fact doesn’t really figure in to his case.

“It’s just kind of an interesting twist,” he said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.