USS JOHN C. STENNIS – Navy investigators on supercarrier USS John C. Stennis (CVN-74) have no leads after a string of three gruesome murders onboard the ship, officials report.

The first incident occurred nearly five weeks ago, though a media blackout was ordered by the ships commander, Rear Admiral Troy Shoemaker, due to the Stennis’ current state of deployment. After the third body was discovered aboard the vessel covered in multiple wounds closely resembling forensic samples of grizzly attacks on hikers in the Pacific Northwest, investigators zeroed in on a suspect.

Initially a single, active duty Petty Officer was taken in for questioning by Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) agents afloat, but he was released shortly thereafter when a solid alibi was confirmed.

While the sailor in question, Petty Officer Third Class Eugene Bear, has not filed a complaint, sailors who know him are insisting that this was a crystal clear example of racial profiling.

“I find it disgusting,” claimed Lt. Jennifer McArthur, Eugene’s Officer In Charge. “Just because there are a couple minor incidents closely resembling bear maulings, the first thing they do is accuse the only bear on the Stennis. That’s an undeniably racist attitude.”

Other forms of support trickled in via letters to NCIS agents investigating the murders.

“It was really surprising how quickly we started to hear from other sailors on Eugene’s whereabouts during the victims’ times of death," Special Agent Tom Lowell told reporters. "I hadn’t considered just how tough it could be to hide a full grown, 750 pound bear in this tin can. He’s pretty much accounted for at all times.”

This has left NCIS mystified, without answers as to how these victims could have come across their cruel fate. A second on-ship bear, either brown, black, or panda, has been definitively ruled out by seasoned investigators. Likewise, agents have noted the strict impossibility of any unarmed human responsibility. “The human claw is too soft and delicate to rend flesh in this manner,” noted Lowell.

The agency’s current theory suggests the use of some unique weapon, which may have been smuggled past the tight security of the ship. The current case is being treated as an intentional frame job, likely by a person or group with political anti-bear leanings.

One expert acquainted with Petty Officer Bear has also related his findings to the media.

“Now, in the case of Eugene,” said Floyd Dirkmeister, a 65-year-old Seattle native, “we already have extensive data on his methods, and frankly they don’t add up with the Stennis victims' data. As you can see from these graphs, when Eugene has accidentally killed or injured fellow sailors in the past, his fight-or-flight reflex causes him to lunge with a bite to the throat first. The Stennis killer clearly started with swiping motions around the abdominal area, and subsequent wounds were made to the neck postmortem.”

Petty Officer Eugene Bear continues to perform in the top fifth percentile of United States Navy personnel, despite a brief hiccup pertaining to height and weight standards.

Friends have mentioned that he is taking his recent experience better than they expected and, as usual, is simply not talking very much.