Steve Lehto opened his latest Lehto’s Law episode with the kind of story that sounds like a parody until you realize it’s playing out in real time in Ohio: dozens of sheriff’s cruisers in Lorain County are allegedly at risk of repossession because a fleet bill wasn’t paid, and the sheriff’s office, the county commissioners, and the deputies’ association are now publicly arguing over who was supposed to handle it.
Lehto, who said viewers sent him the tip along with a News 5 Cleveland report written by Caitlin Hunt, Drew Scoffield, and Damon Maloney, made it clear he wasn’t automatically taking a side, because the facts land in that awkward zone where “this should’ve been a routine payment” collides with “this could turn into a public safety headache” if the dispute drags on.
The reason it hits so hard is that this isn’t a fight about some obscure line item buried in a spreadsheet; it’s a fight about police cars – high-visibility equipment that the public notices immediately when it’s missing, and that deputies can’t just “make do without” if they’re expected to patrol, respond, and show up fast when something goes wrong.
The Repossession Claim That Set Everyone On Edge
Lehto explained that the first loud alarm came from the Lorain County Deputies Association, which pointed to what he described as a Facebook-post-driven warning that the Lorain County Commissioners had defaulted on lease payments with Enterprise Fleet Management, and that the situation was serious enough that repossessions could begin as soon as Monday.
According to Lehto’s retelling, the deputies association claimed the commissioners had failed to pay $57,000 in lease payments, and that the practical effect could be dramatic: 41 cruisers might be repossessed, which is the kind of number that instantly changes the mood inside a sheriff’s department because it implies a chunk of the daily fleet could suddenly vanish…