POULSBO — Trial dates are scheduled for two men suspected of burglarizing The Loft restaurant and a home on 5th Avenue in August.
Jason Wymer pleaded not guilty Nov. 21 and was released on $15,000 bail. An omnibus hearing is scheduled for Dec. 15. Trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 10 at 9 a.m.
An omnibus hearing is a pretrial hearing to determine the admissibility of evidence, including testimony and evidence seized at the time of arrest.
David Armstrong Nunes pleaded not guilty on Nov. 29. An omnibus hearing is scheduled for Jan 25; trial starts Feb. 21, 9 a.m.
When the burglaries occurred, Wymer and his family were living in a transitional house on 4th and Viewmont that had been assigned to them by Kitsap Community Resources. Armstrong-Nunes was, as Detective David Gesell put it, “couch-surfing” at the house, which is against KCR’s rules.
The 5th Avenue home was burglarized while its residents were home Aug. 9; gone were a 60-inch TV, an Xbox game console, a laptop computer, and a coin collection.
The Loft was burglarized on the morning of Aug. 15; the office was ransacked and one of the safes was taken, Gesell said.
Gesell reported at the time, “On that same morning, a witness saw a suspicious vehicle on her property and called her father to check the area. When the father arrived, the car was gone but the stolen safe from The Loft was found and had been broken into. Multiple pieces of evidence were recovered at that scene.”
The investigation led to the Aug. 24 arrest of Armstrong-Nunes and Wymer at 418 Viewmont St.
During a search of the house, police found stolen property from the 5th Avenue house, as well as drug paraphernalia. Armstrong-Nunes and Wymer were booked and the remaining occupants of the house were evicted a couple of days later.
The burglaries – and Wymer’s alleged involvement – caused a neighborhood uproar over the use of the house as a transitional home. The house is owned by the First Lutheran Church of Poulsbo and is offered for temporary housing for families facing homelessness through One Church One Family, a coalition of Kitsap County churches. Kitsap Community Resources does the placement and case management.
Executive Director Larry Eyer and Housing Director Darlene Cook said that, as required, a criminal background check was done on the couple assigned to the house but that nothing came back. However, a check of the Washington Courts online database showed that Wymer was a defendant in at least 14 cases in seven different courts in Washington state.
The Lutheran Church, KCR and Mayor Becky Erickson met with neighborhood residents in October. Another neighborhood meeting was held Dec. 11 for residents of 9th Avenue, where another house is proposed for use as a transitional home. That house is privately owned, but is being offered through St. Olaf’s Church and One Church One Family.
