ROCHESTER, Washington (KING-5) An unexpected development is keeping soldiers from seeing their families for at least the next few days, but it's not what you might think.

The soldiers are in the US and back at their home base, but they still can't go home.

Is that daddy? Dah dah daddy. Yeah, that's daddy.

It's been five days since Jayden Tirasedtanun has seen his father in person.

But Afghanistan Veteran David Tirasedtanun is not deployed...

To the anger of his mother and stepfather, he's under lockdown at Joint Base Lewis McChord.

"This is not the way to do it. I'd like to see him come home."

David, along with about a hundred other soldiers from the 4th Stryker Brigade find themselves stuck inside the gates of the base.

No one can leave until military police catch a thief suspected among them.

His mother Shelley Dunbar says, "if one fails, all fail. One person's in trouble, they all get in trouble.

A flyer posted on base says the thief or thieves stole sensitive military gear over the holidays.

JBLM says no weapons are missing, but hundreds of pieces of weapon attachments are. Things like rifle scopes and night vision gear.

Kevin Dunbar, his stepfather says, "you expect soldiers to be upstanding and not do this kind of behavior, but I'm also upset with the way the military are doing this.

Lockdowns are a common military practice in cases like these.
One happened in 2001 over just one pair of goggles.
But this time —

"This is a lot bigger deal than one pair of glasses," says K. Dunbar.

Some soldiers have been venting on facebook about that lockdown that caught many of them by surprise. For David Tirasedtanun's family, it's especially tough... Today is David's birthday.

He's always strived and worked very very hard to be first in everything that he does, and also along with his men, so when something like this happens, it frustrates the devil out of him," says S. Dunbar.