I ran into this issue in 4.4, what i was told was. When you spawn a mob then Give it any items the items go into there invintory so you cant save it..

if you add the items during the #spawn command it works because its part of the mobs visual effect.

#spawn <Name> <Race> <Level> <Material> <HP> <Gender> <Class> <Item_Visual_1> <Item_Visual_2> <Merchant_ID>

thats the order of the commands