Lexington Man Indicted After Dozens of Guns, Ammo Seized From His Home

WOBURN, MA – A 49-year-old Lexington man was indicted Tuesday on firearms charges after Lexington police seized 83 guns and 10,000 rounds of ammunition from his home during an investigation into allegations that Robert Ivarson racially harassed his black neighbors.

A Middlesex grand jury on Tuesday indicated Ivarson, 49, of Lexington, on charges of possession of a large-capacity firearm (two counts), possession of a firearm without a firearms identification card (three counts) and possession of chemical mace without an FID card.

No arraignment date has been scheduled in superior court.

In December of 2016, Lexington police responded to a report of banana peels being thrown into the driveway of a Lexington home. Officers were told that this wasn't the first time it had occurred; over the course of the year, 30 to 40 banana peels had allegedly been thrown into the driveway, according to the Middlesex County District Attorney's office.

Police began to conduct video surveillance of the home and identified Ivarson, a nearby resident, as a suspect. He was arrested after police allegedly saw him throwing banana peels onto his neighbor's Tarbell Avenue driveway on three consecutive mornings.

Ivarson was charged in Concord District Court with three counts of civil rights violations and one count of criminal harassment in a series of incidents, which investigators allege targeted a neighboring family, who is black.

During a subsequent search of Ivarson's home, police seized 50- pounds of black gunpowder, 83 firearms , close to 10,000 rounds of ammunition and large-capacity feeding devices, according to the DA's office. Police also found a World War II German-style helmet with a Nazi insignia.

According to police records cited by the Boston Globe, officers found "numerous weapons" in Ivarson's home when they were called there twice in the 1990s.

Courtesy photo of items seized from Robert Ivarson's Lexington home.