RSSSheriff releases videos of ‘Dog’ catch
Andrew Distel is seen at far right after he was brought to the Mesa County Jail on July 20.
Surveillance videos in the lobby of the Mesa County Sheriff’s Department show visitors and employees in coughing fits after the arrival of a pepper-sprayed fugitive delivered by celebrity bounty hunter Duane “Dog” Chapman and his team.
Jail staff are seen rearranging trash cans and furniture to prop open doors, an apparent effort to clear the air, after 29-year-old Andrew Distel was escorted through the lobby of the facility.
The videos, three of them shot from different angles, were released Wednesday by the Sheriff’s Department after The Daily Sentinel requested them under the Colorado Open Records Act.
The videos show events largely consistent with those described by Mesa County Sheriff Stan Hilkey in a July 20 blog, which criticized Chapman’s team for exposing a contaminated Distel to other people in the building. Hilkey said the jail refused to accept Distel until he was cleared medically.
Hilkey slammed Chapman’s work as “profit-driven peacockery,” while the Chapmans defended their handling of events July 20. Duane Chapman told The Associated Press he may run for sheriff in Mesa County after retiring from television.
Distel remains jailed and has declined an interview request.
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