AUSTINBURG TOWNSHIP —
A homeless man is scheduled for his preliminary hearing in Eastern County Court on Tuesday following a weekend incident reminiscent of the Wild West.
Lee E. Nash, 56, was arrested Saturday evening by Ashtabula County sheriff’s deputies after three armed citizens surrounded Kusar’s camper-trailer in which Nash was found sleeping next to a sawed-off 12-gauge shotgun.
John Kusar Jr., Austinburg Township trustee and owner of the property on which Nash was discovered, said he and two other men armed themselves after Kusar searched the camper and found Nash sleeping there with the gun.
“We had him pinned down, and we were all armed,” Kusar said.
Kusar said the citizens who surrounded the trailer armed themselves with a pistol, assault rifle and 30/ 30 rifle. The guns were not fired, but Kusar said the men were serious about protecting themselves if Nash came out shooting.
“If he had come out of that trailer (before the deputies got there), we would have had to call the coroner,” Kusar said.
Kusar said the deputies arrived about 10 minutes after the Sheriff’s Department was alerted to the situation. According to the Sheriff’s Department report, Nash went for his weapon when the deputy awoke him. The report makes no mention of the citizens having been armed.
Nash was arraigned Monday on charges of felonious assault and breaking and entering Kusar’s property. He is being held on a $10,000 bond and has been scheduled for arraignment Tuesday, according to court records.
The precipitating event that sent the men searching for Nash, formerly of Route 46 North, was a breaking-and-entering incident at the home of an elderly Allen Road resident. The female victim reportedly was injured by the intruder and required hospitalization.
Nash was linked to the crime by the discovery of two pillowcases with wine bottles and shotgun shells near the Western Reserve Greenway Trail and Lampson Road, an Ashtabula County sheriff’s report said. The items in the pillowcases were identified as belonging to the injured woman, the report shows.
According to the report, Nash was arrested recently for other burglaries: On July 17, Nash was arrested after people attending a block party in Austinburg Township came home to find him in their garage with stolen property from their residence. On June 21, Nash was arrested for burglary at a Clay Street residence.
Kusar said he and a relative of the elderly victim put together the search party based upon the accumulation of evidence against the homeless man. Nash reportedly was living in the woods along the Western Reserve Greenway Trail, between Lampson and Allen Road. He also was spotted on River Glen Road, and a woman reported being startled by Nash after he jumped out of a ditch along Allen Road, Kusar said.
The men suspected that Nash had stolen a gun during one of the burglaries and prepared themselves for an encounter.
“We armed ourselves because he was armed,” Kusar said.
The men took the investigation into their own hands because the Sheriff’s Department lacks the manpower to do investigations, because of budget cuts.
“It’s a damned shame the Ashtabula County commissioners will fund the Geneva State Lodge and not fund the sheriff,” Kusar said.
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