These former soldiers stole a live rocket and kept it in a closet for months

someone is in deep DODO...
I wondere who failed to account for all the expended casings...

Alright.....

This is "stupidity criminality" as opposed to "malicious criminality."

This is the reason we have amnesty barrels. As noted in the article, it was a LAW (we don't use them anymore to the best my knowledge because the are unreliable as hell). We used to have SPENT LAW/AT4/etc all over the place pre9/11 and it was "no big thing." But an unspent one should never have made it into the inventory, let alone someones possession.

The problem likely happened when "young knucklehead" (remember these guys were probably 22~ at the time) realized he had a career ending situation on his hand and he had no way out of it.

If he escalates up, he's %^+++. He. An't get rid of it without risking more people. So in his "young knucklehead" mind, it's a paperweight if no one is touching it.

The problem is bad situations aren't like wine or whiskey. They don't get better with age. They curdle like milk.

I wonder what they planned on doing with it.