New criminal charges for the ‘Barefoot Bandit’

The notorious “Barefoot Bandit,” the teenager from Camano Island, Wash. who made international headlines, is charged with two more crimes.

The prosecutor in Skagit County, Rich Weyrich has charged Colton Harris-Moore, now 21, in connection with the theft of an airplane in 2010, allegedly part of a lengthy crime spree centered mostly in the San Juan Islands. The airplane, stolen from Arlington, sustained minimal damage when it landed on Orcas Island.

Then a teenager, Harris-Moore wad dubbed the “Barefoot Bandit” because footprints and outlines of footprints were left at some crime scenes.

Weyrich gives no explanation for the timing of the charges.
“He has to be held accountable for what he did in Skagit County.”

Harris-Moore is serving a 6-1/2 year prison sentence after he pleaded guilty in Island County and in federal court in Seattle to multiple felony counts following lengthy negotiations involving multiple jurisdictions. Weyrich was not a part of those discussions and re-filed charges he originally filed in 2010.

“I’m not going to make any comment on what other counties or the federal government did, or didn’t do,” said Weyrich.

Harris-Moore’s attorney, John Henry Browne tells The Seattle Times the charges a “horrendous waste of time.”

Weyrich acknowledges that a judge in Skagit County could sentence Harris-Moore to the time he’s already doing in state prison. But he wouldn’t comment on his sentencing recommendation if Harris-Moore is convicted of the two new charges.

Harris-Moore was captured in July 2010 after stealing an airplane in Indiana and crash landing it in the Bahamas. He is due in court Feb. 28 in Mount Vernon to enter pleas to charges of burglary and theft.