Floyd County’s new K9 helps find man after shot fired, chase Thursday evening

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

A Nora Springs man has been charged with felony eluding after a gunshot was allegedly fired near a Floyd County deputy making a traffic stop on another vehicle. The man was taken into custody after the county’s new K9 helped locate him following a six-mile high-speed chase, according to court records.

Documents filed in Floyd County District Court by Deputy Luke Chatfield, the county’s new K9 handler, say he was making a traffic stop near 150th Street and Glass Avenue, less than a mile north of Rudd, at 10:42 p.m. Thursday, when another vehicle approached from the west.

“The vehicle came to a stop west of my location. A shot was fired from the vehicle,” Chatfield’s report said.

He said that vehicle, a white Dodge Durango SUV, then sped away and Chatfield pursued the vehicle, which traveled at more than 85 mph and did not stop despite Chatfield’s emergency lights and siren being on. The vehicle failed to make the corner at 140th Street and Echo Avenue, entered a field drive, then “jumped the back side of the ditch into the field.”

“The defendant then traveled west across the section where I located the vehicle unoccupied and disabled in the 1200 block of Dancer Avenue,” Chatfield’s report said. “Once other deputies and state troopers arrived we were able to clear the vehicle. While clearing the vehicle I could smell the strong odor of alcoholic beverage coming from the vehicle. K9 Sirius was deployed leading us west into the harvested corn field.”

Because of the possibility the person being pursued was armed, a perimeter was established until additional law enforcement arrived, then a search located John Andrew Salocker, age, 39, of Nora Springs, lying on his back in the corn field, a short distance away from where K9 Sirius had tracked him, the report said.

Salocker was charged with eluding involving injury, OWI or drugs, while exceeding the speed limit by 25 mph or more, while participating in a felony, a Class D felony.

On Friday, Floyd County Attorney Rachel Ginbey filed a motion in district court to release Salocker to pre-trial supervision because he was hospitalized with a broken back and the Sheriff’s Office was unable to provide 24-hour custody at the hospital.