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New technology helped in big arrest for Lucas County Sheriff Office

The Lucas County Sheriff is crediting a new technology for a big arrest after one of their own was put in a life threatening situation Monday night.

TOLEDO, OH (WTOL) - The Lucas County Sheriff Office is crediting a new technology for a big arrest after one of their own was put in a life threatening situation Monday night.

John Bartlett is currently behind bars at the Lucas County Jail after he pulled a gun on a deputy.  But it was the office's star chase system that got him arrested before he could hurt or kill anyone.

The Sheriff said one of his deputies caught Bartlett  dumpster diving and asked him to leave. But rather than leave, he pulled out a gun, got in his car and began to drive off.

That deputy who confronted Bartlett was able to deploy a dart from the Star Chase System from the front of his cruiser. That dart stuck to Bartlett's car which allowed the deputy and dispatchers to track the suspect with GPS, rather then a high speed pursuit.

"They were able to track him with GPS and other jurisdictions got involved and they knew his location and speed and were able to get in front of him and get stop sticks out and stop him," said Captain Matt Lettke.

The star chase system used for the arrest is one of five units purchased by the Sheriff's Office with grant money over a year ago.

Monday night was actually the first chance one of their cruisers was in the position to use it and deploy a dart.

"This was the first time that this was the perfect case scenario and we are happy with the outcome we will mark this as a win because there was no serious injury or loss of life we did not crash any of our vehicles and there were no citizens of the suspect hurt," said Lettke.

Sheriff John Tharp said hopes this arrest and success story will allow him to gather more funding to purchase more units for his deputies's cruisers.

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