RAVENNA | Lawsuit-Heavy Portage County Sheriff’s Office Faces Oct. 30 Records Deadline From Fostoria Free Press

Author: FFP Ai Bot

Disclosure: The Fostoria Free Press is a party to the public records dispute described in this story.

RAVENNA, Ohio – The Portage County Sheriff’s Office, led by Sheriff Bruce D. Zuchowski, has spent much of the past 15 years answering lawsuits over its jail, its traffic stops and its handling of public records. Now it faces a records deadline set by The Fostoria Free Press, which says it will ask the Ohio Supreme Court for a writ of mandamus if the office does not produce the records it requested by Thursday, Oct. 30, 2026.

A writ of mandamus is a court order that compels a government office to perform a duty the law requires. Here, that duty is producing public records under Ohio Revised Code 149.43.

How the records fight started

The dispute grew out of the Randolph Fair in late August. Videos posted to a Facebook page called The Bad Bruce Exhibit showed confrontations between Zuchowski and William Lane, a Portage County resident and longtime critic of the office. In one clip Lane asked whether the sheriff had been drinking, and Zuchowski pointed to a plastic bottle and said it was water.

In an Aug. 31 statement reported by Cleveland 19, the sheriff’s office called the intoxication claim absurd, described Lane as a recently convicted felon with a years-long personal vendetta, and said Lane and his young son entered the sheriff’s booth on Aug. 26 and started a confrontation with volunteers. The office said witnesses, including the Portage County prosecutor, confirmed the sheriff was not impaired. Lane has denied trying to provoke an arrest and says his goal is accountability.

On Sept. 4, The Fostoria Free Press filed a public records request with the office seeking fair incident reports and dispatch records, body and cruiser camera video from Aug. 26 and Aug. 29, complaints and internal-affairs files involving Zuchowski and Chief Deputy Ralph Spidalieri, policies on alcohol, firearms at public events, camera use and records requests, the office’s statements about the fair, related emails and texts, and its records-retention schedule.

On Oct. 4, the Free Press sent a pre-litigation notice saying the office had ignored a follow-up and had not produced the records in a timely manner. The notice set Oct. 30 as the date to produce the records and avoid an original action in the Ohio Supreme Court. As of this report, the records have not been produced.

The baking soda drug case

In August 2024, Zephaniah Robinson and Jack Metcalf sued Zuchowski and deputies Sean Bradley, Robert Paolucci and Anthony Zappone in federal court over an Aug. 29, 2023, traffic stop on Interstate 76 in Brimfield Township. Both men were charged with first-degree felony cocaine trafficking and possession after deputies reported that about 65 grams of white powder behind the driver’s seat field-tested positive, according to WKYC and the Record-Courier. The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation later found no controlled substance, and the charges were dropped. The complaint said the powder was baking soda the car owner had used to deal with a water problem.

The defendants denied wrongdoing. The men voluntarily dismissed the suit in March 2025 after mediation failed, and the dismissal was without prejudice, meaning it could be refiled, the Record-Courier reported.

Lane’s own lawsuits

Lane, a Marine veteran and hemp farmer who has run The Bad Bruce Exhibit since 2024, traces his dispute with the sheriff to a 2023 traffic stop in which deputies searched his vehicle after saying they smelled marijuana. Nothing was found and he was not charged. A federal civil-rights suit over that stop was dismissed. In 2025 he filed a second federal lawsuit alleging the sheriff and two other employees retaliated against him for his social media page, The Portager reported. Lane has also filed public records complaints against the office in the Ohio Court of Claims.

The sheriff’s office has said Lane is a convicted felon on probation. In an August 2025 store encounter Lane recorded, Zuchowski said, “You will regret the day you ever met me.” Lane called it a threat; the office said no threat was made.

The jail cases

Older suits centered on the Portage County Jail, many from before Zuchowski took office:

– Larry Tawney Jr. alleged that masked officers beat him in his cell overnight on July 12-13, 2018. A federal judge granted summary judgment to the defendants after finding jail video and photos contradicted his account, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed in June 2022, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case.
– The county’s insurer paid $175,000 in 2013 to settle a federal suit by the estate of Joshua D. McDaniel, 25, of Bryan, who died in 2011 after a seizure and fall from a top bunk in the jail. The county admitted no liability, the Record-Courier reported.
– The estate of Kenneth R. Mantell, who hanged himself in the jail in 2010, sued the county and jail officers in federal court.

What comes next

Not every case went against the office: the Tawney claims ended in the defendants’ favor, Lane’s first federal suit was dismissed, and the baking soda suit was dropped. The Free Press has said that if the records are not produced by Oct. 30, it will ask the Ohio Supreme Court to order their release. This story is developing.

Sources
Ohio Revised Code 149.43 – https://codes.ohio.gov/ohio-revised-code/section-149.43
Cleveland 19, Aug. 31, 2026 – https://www.cleveland19.com/2026/08/31/portage-county-sheriffs-office-addresses-social-media-post-alleges-harassment-by-felon/
Cleveland 19, Aug. 6, 2025 – https://www.cleveland19.com/2025/08/06/you-will-regret-day-you-ever-met-me-portage-county-sheriff-allegedly-threatens-man-inside-local-store/
The Fostoria Free Press, Sept. 4, 2026 – https://thefostoriafreepress.com/portage-county-sheriff-bruce-zuchowski-served-with-public-records-request/
The Fostoria Free Press, Oct. 4, 2026 – https://thefostoriafreepress.com/ravenna-oh-pre-lawsuit-complaint-filed-against-portage-county-sheriffs-office/
WKYC – https://www.wkyc.com/article/news/local/portage-county/2-ravenna-men-sue-portage-county-sheriff-deputies-false-drug-charges/95-1306d6e9-e449-4b29-9244-bcb33a3f4f7d
Record-Courier, April 17, 2025 – https://www.record-courier.com/story/news/local/2025/04/17/2-men-drop-wrongful-arrest-lawsuit-against-portage-county-sheriff-deputies/83122843007/
The Portager – https://theportager.com/sheriffs-office-denies-allegations-in-ongoing-civil-rights-case/
The Portager – https://theportager.com/local-activist-behind-bad-bruce-exhibit-sues-zuchowski-for-alleged-retaliation/
Tawney v. Portage County, 6th Cir. No. 21-3809 – https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca6/21-3809/21-3809-2022-06-15.html
Record-Courier, March 17, 2013 – https://eu.record-courier.com/story/news/2013/03/17/federal-lawsuit-over-portage-county/19911912007/