Man chases boys with running chain saw

DELPHOS - What might have sounded like a prank during the Friday the 13th weekend with a man chasing teenage boys with a running chain saw turned out to be the real deal.

Officers from the Delphos Police Department were called to the 500 block of East Fifth Street on Sunday evening after a woman came across the boys. The woman told police she thought the boys were joking until she saw the man for herself.

When police arrived they found the four boys and a man walking away from the scene. Officers also found a chain saw lying in a yard near the man.

Police said they tested the man, Eric A. Dewyer, and found him to be intoxicated. Dewyer told police the group of boys had thrown something at his home so he decided to scare them with the chain saw.

The boys denied throwing anything at Dewyer's house and told police he crossed four lanes of traffic to chase them with the chain saw while yelling obscenities and threatening them.

The boys also said Dewyer knocked one of them to the ground. Dewyer was arrested on charges of aggravated menacing, assault and inducing panic. Police seized the chain saw as evidence.