At 10:54pm on 03-27-14 the Pinellas Park Police Department received information from the Troy, New York Police Department that Jesse P. Sawyer was at 8900 US 19 and had an active warrant issued by the FBI. We went to this location (8900 US Highway 19 N) and made contact Sawyer who was cooperative with our investigation. We did learn that there was a warrant in the system for the arrest of Sawyer and we initiated confirmation procedures with the FBI.
We did not receive a response from the FBI in reference to this request so telephone contact was established. The person we spoke to at the FBI could not confirm the warrant and was making telephone calls to an unidentified agent to confirm this. An hour had passed from the time we initiated contact with Sawyer and we had no received warrant confirmation. It was decided that the suspect would be released from the scene due to not receiving a hit confirmation.
A short while later we received confirmation for Sawyer. We returned to the area and learned that Sawyer was gone. We deployed a sheriff’s office helicopter as well as Pinellas Park Police K-9 teams and searched the area with negative results.
To clarify some issues
1. Sawyer was detained pending confirmation. He was not in custody
2. Sawyer did not escape from us not did he climb out of a window to escape
a. When we returned Sawyer was gone and we did not see him
3. We had contact with Sawyer in January
4. The warrant was not issued until March 18th, 2014
Source: Pinellas Park Police Department
