3d Marine Jailed as Spy Suspect : Probe Expands to Leningrad, Rome Diplomatic Offices

A third former Marine security guard has been arrested on suspicion of spying for the Soviet Union, and the probe of security breaches now includes the U.S. Embassy in Rome and the American consulate in Leningrad, the Pentagon said today.

The Marine, Sgt. John Joseph Weirick, was arrested Tuesday and is now confined to the brig at Camp Pendleton, Calif., said Robert Sims, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman.

Weirick is suspected of espionage while working as a security guard at the American consulate office in Leningrad in 1981 and 1982, Sims disclosed.

He also worked briefly as a security guard at the embassy in Moscow and the embassy in Rome.

Security Probed

As a result of his arrest, the security of both the consulate office in Leningrad and the Rome embassy is being investigated, Sims indicated.

Sims said Weirick, 26, of Eureka, Calif., was arrested at his current post with the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing at the Marine Air Station at Tustin.

The spokesman said Weirick was arrested as a result of the continuing probe of Sgt. Clayton J. Lonetree, a former embassy guard in Moscow who was charged in January with espionage.

Sims said there was no connection between Lonetree and Weirick “beyond the similarity of Soviet methods” and the fact that Weirick had been identified in the course of the Lonetree probe.

Contacts Unreported

Asked what he meant by the similarity of Soviet methods, Sims said it appeared that Weirick had “unreported contacts with Soviet citizens, including women.”

Pentagon sources have disclosed that Lonetree and Cpl. Arnold Bracy, another Moscow security guard, became involved sexually with Soviet women while working in the Russian capital in 1985 and 1986. The women then introduced the two guards to Soviet agents, the sources say.

The Marine Corps has formally charged Lonetree and Bracy with espionage, alleging that they allowed Soviet agents to enter the U.S. Embassy on numerous occasions and escorted them through high-security offices and communications facilities.

Stufflebeam Charged

Sims disclosed that another Marine arrested in connection with the case, Staff Sgt. Robert S. Stufflebeam, has been formally charged with three counts of “wrongfully failing to report personal contact with a female citizen of a communist-controlled country.”

Stufflebeam has not been accused of espionage, although he worked for a time as the No. 2 man in charge of Moscow embassy security and thus as a supervisor of Lonetree and Bracy.

Sims refused to say whether Weirick was suspected of having allowed Soviet agents inside the Leningrad consulate as opposed to providing sensitive information.

He did say, however, that the alleged espionage work was suspected of having occurred only while Weirick was in Leningrad--from Nov. 18, 1981 to Dec. 2, 1982.

After serving in Leningrad, Weirick was transferred to the embassy in Rome, where he served as a guard until March 4, 1983.

He had last worked as a helicopter mechanic at the Tustin air base, the Pentagon added.

Sims said Weirick would probably be transferred next week to the Marine base at Quantico, Va., where Lonetree and Bracy are being confined in the brig and where Stufflebeam is being confined to the base.