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Law enforcement sweep conducted Friday in county

Law enforcement in Warren County conducted a county-wide sweep Friday.

According to Sheriff Ken Klakamp, officers from various departments served some of the hundreds of bench warrants and summary traffic and non-traffic warrants on record in the county.

“This morning, at 6:30 a.m., sheriff’s deputies, probation officers, police officers from the county started a county-wide warrant sweep,” according to a release on the sheriff’s office Facebook page.

The lead agencies for the sweep were the sheriff’s office, Warren County adult probation, and Youngsville Borough Police, Chief Deputy Chuck Fetzeck said. Assisting agencies included Pennsylvania State Police, City of Warren Police, and Corry Police Department.

As of 4 p.m., the sweep had brought in about 20 defendants, Fetzeck said. “That’s a good result.”

Sheriff Ken Klakamp has declared lessening the backlog of more than 600 warrants to be a priority.

There were some felony warrants on the list Friday, but the majority were for things like failure to appear in court, failure to pay fines and costs, and domestic relations infractions.

Defendants who are skipping out on restitution are hurting the victims, according to the sheriff’s office.

“It’s one thing to dodge not paying fines and cost but it’s not fair to the victims who did nothing wrong but work hard and take care of their families,” according to the Facebook release.

Some victims “might get pennies” toward their restitution, Fetzeck said.

The officers were not able to serve as many warrants as they would have liked.

There were limited numbers of officers and limited time. There were defendants who heard about the sweep.

And some of the warrants served Friday took longer and required more personnel than expected. “We had an individual in Grand Valley get in a foot pursuit,” Fetzeck said. That defendant was captured by Pennsylvania State Police and additional charges have been filed.

While the sweep was in progress, officers also happened across other infractions, including one DUI traffic stop, he said.

In addition to providing some relief for victims and working on the backlog of warrants, Fetzeck said the sweep was a good chance for inter-agency cooperation. “I appreciate the cooperation between all the agencies.” Fetzeck added, “also, thanks go out to the Warren County 911 center dispatchers and Warren Pennsylvania State Police PCO’s for their assistance with communications.” County Commissioner Ben Kafferlin joined Friday’s sweep to see day to day operations, and Fetzeck also offered thanks to the women at the Warren County Sheriff’s Office, who he said “assist us in our day to day operations that go above and beyond for our office and operations.”

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