Low-speed chase with weighed-down truck

RICHLAND CO. – A Michigan man is locked up in Richland County following a daring December act of alleged theft at a location in rural Olney, and word is that federal agents are stunned and impressed at the work county Sheriff Andy Hires and his department has conducted on it.

Jason M. Whorrall, 34, of Redford Township, Michigan, is being held at the Richland County Detention Center on two counts so far: Theft and Burglary, this after the Dec. 21 incident at the residence of Thomas Nix on Highway 250 west of Olney involving a brazen effort to take Snap-On tools from Nix, who is a local dealer for Snap-On.

On that night, an off-duty law enforcement officer driving past the Nix residence – where Nix has a metal pole barn building housing Snap-On tools and material – and believed he saw suspicious activity as he drove by.

The officer observed men leaving in a truck filled with items stacked so high in the bed of the truck that the back end was almost dragging the ground.

The officer ran to the door of the residence, telling Nix he believed he’d just been robbed.

Nix emerged to find that a hole had been cut in the side of the pole barn building, and the Snap-On truck he used had been broken into and ransacked, with almost all the inventory in it having been stolen.

The truck the alleged robbers were getting away in – albeit somewhat sluggishly, as they were weighed down – was located by law enforcement on 250 headed toward Noble.

In an occurrence that was equally terrible and hilarious, the guys in the truck were tossing out high-priced Snap-On tools for miles, in an attempt to lighten the load and get moving.

They weren’t successful; and so, because they couldn’t get away, they apparently opted to try and avert. At least one police vehicle was rammed in this endeavor. Whether the initial collision did enough damage to knock the tailgate completely off the truck, or whether it was due to some other damage (possibly from the weight of the tools), that’s what happened. Soon after that, the truck became either disabled or stuck, and those in it fled.

Whorrell was taken into custody; it’s unclear what happened to the other(s) with him.

While he was being held in jail, Whorrell was allowed to have his cell phone to make some calls.

Displaying his true intellect, Whorrell allegedly made three calls, one of them to the alleged accomplice who fled.

The numbers were immediately tracked by law enforcement and an accomplice was apprehended in the Chicago area. His fate is unclear at this point.

In the meanwhile, Nix, aided by Richland County deputies and Nix’ relatives, scoured the area where the tools had been dumped out of the truck. Over the course of two days, the group scanned and surveyed every ditch and roadside that it was believed the alleged robbers had driven, in an effort to locate all of the expensive tools. Just when they believed they’d located them all, they’d find another Snap-On branded product lying on the road or in a ditch.

However, as it was all gathered up, Nix told authorities that some of the items, while they were Snap-On brand, weren’t from his inventory. To his credit, he advised law enforcement that he couldn’t claim items that weren’t his. So this lead to another issue…and a speculation that the Nix burglary/theft may not be the only one that involved Snap-On tools.

Richland County did a bit of checking and discovered that just three days prior to the Nix case, a dealer in Springfield had also been hit.

That leads to the possibility that a number of dealers throughout the state – between six and 10 of them – had been burglarized/stolen from by the same guys.

It’s been reported that the amount of inventory allegedly stolen reached $130,000, and that because the situation may have run across state lines (from Michigan to Illinois), the feds are involved. They, in fact, were said to have been assisting in tracking Whorrell’s jail phone calls.

They also are said to have been highly impressed with the work that Richland County put into the case and the ingenuity that lead to the arrest of the accomplice up north. A lead investigator from the St. Louis area is said to have been shocked and pleased at the work of the department, as the thefts had been going on and the feds had no leads whatsoever on the multi-site burglaries, some of the biggest burglaries in recent memory.

Whorrell’s bond has been set at $15,000 cash. The latest information Disclosure had on him came in on January 27 when the file was viewed; his material is not available online at judici.com, likely because of the ongoing investigation and multi-site nature of it…along with the likelihood that there is still a remaining accomplice out there.

As such, Whorrell’s next court date was unavailable as of press time.