Alleged jail victim arrested last week

Published 9:06 am Wednesday, September 2, 2015

The man at the center of an upcoming federal criminal trial over his alleged treatment at the Lawrence County Jail last year spent another four hours at that facility less than a week ago.

Larry Kinstler, 40, of State Route 141, Ironton, was arrested on Aug. 28 for disorderly conduct, obstructing official business and resisting arrest by Ironton Police.

His arrest followed an incident between him and police officer Adam Koch, and adult probation officers, Carl Bowen and Lynn Stewart.

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The probation officers were seeking a woman with an outstanding warrant. Arriving at an Ironton address where they believed the woman to be, they were met on the sidewalk by Kinstler, according to Koch’s report.

“While the suspect was questioning myself and the witness, Lynn Stewart, the suspect stood in front of us attempting to keep us from walking on the sidewalk to the residence,” the report states. “The suspect appeared to be under the influence of an unknown substance due to his abnormal behavior that he displayed on the scene.”

The officer asked Kinstler to identify himself, which he repeatedly refused, according to Koch.

“The suspect then stepped back into a defense stance throwing up his arms and raising his voice in an aggressive manner,” the report states. “Upon attempting to place suspect in handcuffs, he pulled away in an attempt to escape arrest. Upon grabbing onto the suspect’s left arm myself and Carl Bowen safely placed the suspect to the ground. While on the ground the suspect refused to give officers his hands for hand cuffing and continued to resist arrest.”

Kinstler was an inmate at the Lawrence County Jail in August of 2014 where he was allegedly assaulted by then corrections officers, Jeremy S. Hanshaw, Ronald S. Hatfield and Jason D. Mays. At that time Kinstler, who was arrested by the Ohio State Highway Patrol, was charged with disorderly conduct by intoxication. That case was dismissed in Ironton Municipal Court a week later because it was not filed on time.

A videotape of the alleged incident at the jail was part of the focus of a federal indictment brought against the three officers in January. That followed an investigation by Lawrence County Sheriff Jeff Lawless after he learned of the alleged incident less than a week after Kinstler’s arrest.

A jail employee told Lawless about the videotape that led the sheriff to conduct an investigation.

Detectives concluded the three officers had engaged in “the inappropriate treatment” of an inmate, according to a sheriff’s release. The federal indictment charges the three men with a violation of Kinstler’s civil rights to be free from the use of unreasonable force by law enforcement.

This spring Kinstler filed a civil lawsuit in U.S. District Court, Southern District of Ohio, against Lawless, chief deputy Jeff Hitchcock and the three former jailers.

The federal criminal trial against the officers is scheduled to begin Monday, Sept. 21, in the U.S. District Court of Judge Timothy Black in Cincinnati.

Kinstler will be arraigned on Tuesday for the misdemeanor charges in the courtroom of Ironton Municipal Court O. Clark Collins.