LAKELAND, Fla. — A man is behind bars after apparently trying to trick law enforcement with a message written on a dry-erase board placed in front of a home.
Polk County Sheriff's Office deputies came across the handwritten message around 2:45 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 14, when they arrived at a house on West 10th Street on reports of a wanted person being there.
The person in question was 41-year-old Johnny Yates who was wanted for aggravated battery, false imprisonment and tampering in a second-degree felony.
The dry-erase board was placed in front of a window with the message, "Johnny Yates does NOT live here!!”
"Gee…a dry-erase board never lied to us before—should we believe it?" the sheriff's office joked in a post on Facebook.
While in the area, deputies reportedly saw a person leaving the house. When they were asked if Yates was inside, they confirmed he was along with other people.
This led law enforcement to surround the house and call out through a speaker. But no one inside the house responded for an hour, deputies explained.
It wasn't until "surrender smoke" was dispensed inside the home that four people came outside – but Yates allegedly wasn't part of that group. Deputies continued to call out to the 41-year-old and used more smoke once that wasn't successful.
It wasn't until deputies and K-9 Dexter entered the house that Yates was found hiding in a modified chest of drawers, the agency said. He was then arrested and taken to jail.
"In regards to the four people who weren’t cooperating with deputies, each one received a parting gift: a charge of resisting and an all-expense paid trip to Grady Judd’s Bed & Breakfast," the sheriff's office wrote on Facebook.
