DATE:  July 29, 2010

On July 28, 2010, Officer Tom Wahl investigated vandalism and break-ins to two soda machines in Irvine Park. Officer Wahl collected evidence left at the scene, which included a golf club that may have been used to break into the machines. Officer Wahl determined approximately $1500.00 worth of damage was done to two machines and approximately $56.00 in $1.00 bills was taken.

The information that Officer Wahl gathered was passed on to the next two patrol shifts, and a priority patrol effort was to locate and apprehend the suspects. On third shift, at about 3:46 a.m., Officer Deb Brettingen saw two subjects crawling up a ditch in the 800 block of First Ave., near the Hockey Arena. Officer Brettingen and Sgt. David BeBeau gave chase after the two subjects fled on foot for a short distance before stopping and complying with police orders.

The two subjects were identified as Benjamin R. Bowe, age 19 and Tyler J. Eichner, age 17, both of Chippewa Falls. Bowe and Eichner admitted to officers that they had just broken into a soda machine at Ojibwa Golf Course which is located just outside the City of Chippewa Falls in Chippewa County. Based on that information officers arrested both subjects and continued to investigate the possibility of their involvement in the thefts and vandalism to the soda machines from Irvine Park on the previous night.

Bowe and Eichner cooperated with Officer Brettingen and Sgt. BeBeau and provided them with information about how they were responsible for breaking into the soda machines at Irvine Park and Ojibwa Golf Course. As a result both subjects were arrested on a Felony charge of Criminal Damage to a coin/currency/card operated machine and two misdemeanors each: Entry into locked coin boxes; and Theft. Both were incarcerated at the Chippewa County Jail.