CHESTER TOWNSHIP, Ohio (WJW) -- Two men face charges related to an angry confrontation outside of a church preschool during which police said at least one shot was fired.
Police said it happened Tuesday morning when a tow truck driver was repossessing a vehicle from a home on Caves Road.
The driver pulled into the parking lot of Mayfield United Methodist Church near the home to better secure the vehicle he was repossessing.
A dashboard-mounted camera in the tow truck shows a vehicle approach him from the front, blocking him in.
Even before that vehicle comes to a complete stop, the passenger exits with a handgun, pointing it at the tow truck driver as he angrily approaches.
"The dude kept flashing the gun, pointed it at me, cocking it and then he shot towards the back of my truck. ... He kept threatening he's going to put a bullet in my head, he's getting three more dudes to follow me to make sure I'm not calling the police," the tow truck driver told a police dispatcher in a call made after the incident.
A camera facing the inside of the tow truck shows the driver being assaulted and pulled out of the driver's side window.
"During the course of the event, the individual is being ordered from the tow truck to release the vehicle. The gun, of course, is being pointed at him, as you know, and at some point, the gun was discharged in his direction," said Chester Township Police Chief Craig Young.
"I couldn't get it unstrapped fast enough and, you know, then he fired the gun off and then kept threatening me. He pointed it at me several times," the driver told police.
"This occurred in a church parking lot where there is a preschool in session, so now we enter into a situation where technically you are in a school safety zone and you are discharging a firearm -- and really that's the reason this investigation is ongoing," said Young.
In addition to being roughed up and threatened, the tow truck driver told police his assailants took his cell phone and threw it into a pond.
One of them them got into the vehicle that was being repossessed and the other into the vehicle they arrived in and both drove off.
The tow truck driver made his 911 call from a phone at a nearby gas station, giving police the address from where the vehicle was being repossessed and the name of the vehicle owner on the account, Ronald Delisio.
Chester Township police went to the home where they took both Ronald and Kevin Delisio into custody.
"We had dialogue with them. We were able to get them to come out of the residence without incident, and that's about the best conclusion of this that I could have hoped for," said Young.
According to court records, charges include kidnapping and aggravated robbery.
"We are going to have additional charges that these individuals are going to face because they made a poor decision not only when it concerned the repossession of a vehicle, but they made a poor decision by doing such a thing that they did on school property," said Young.
Police said the bullet that was fired did not hit the church building, but Young said the confrontation is an example of how something as anger-provoking as a repossession can escalate into something much more serious.
"I guess really the message here is, 'No matter what's happening, no matter how frustrated you can get over things, whether it be a repossession or, as we see now, a lot of road rage situations, just always keep a calm head. Because once you get it to a point like this got to, you are going to make decisions that have unintended or intended consequences that aren't going to be to your benefit,'" said Young.
"It's a car. You know, at the end of the day, this is a vehicle and I can't stress enough to never put yourself in a situation where violence can occur or you are making bad decisions over a piece of property."