A man arrested on a firearms charge last week has been identified as a suspect in the disappearance of Box Elder County farmer Dylan Rounds.

James Adrian Brenner, 59, appeared for a detention hearing in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City on Wednesday on a charge of felon in possession of a firearm. Charging documents said Brenner lived in a trailer a few miles from Rounds’ farm and asked a nearby resident to hold several firearms for him after investigators initially interviewed him about the young farmer.

Brenner had several convictions in Illinois, including a 2012 case for being a felon possessing a firearm. Prosecutors said in charging documents that police seized three black-powder rifles and a .22 caliber rifle that they alleged Brenner had possessed in a trailer where he was living about 5 miles from Rounds’ farm.

Rounds was reported missing on May 30 from his farm in the Lucin area. Box Elder County Sheriff’s Office detectives and FBI agents are investigating the case. Charging documents said investigators first interviewed Brenner on June 7. The man has been “squatting” on property next to Rounds’ farm, the documents said.

Brenner is known to have had contact with Rounds and is a suspect in his disappearance, prosecutors said. The nearby resident told investigators that Brenner brought the rifles to him, explaining that “the last time he had trouble with the law they took everything from him, and he did not want the things he had left to be taken again.”

In the detention hearing Wednesday, U.S. Magistrate Brooke Wells appointed a federal public defender for Brenner and ordered that he be held pending further court appearances.

U.S. marshals took Brenner to the Weber County Jail, where many federal prisoners are held under contract with the Marshals’ Service.

Meanwhile, the Box Elder County Sheriff’s Office has asked members of the public to refrain from further searches for Rounds. Family members and friends have conducted several organized searches, but further searches at this point have a potential to comprise the criminal investigation, the sheriff’s office said in a social media post Wednesday.

Rounds’ family issued a statement that said, in part, “We are not asking for or requesting any additional public searches for Dylan Rounds at this time. We request that everyone allow law enforcement to continue their organized investigation without any hindrance or interference, in order to avoid jeopardizing the investigation.”

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