Task force gets distinguished award

March 12, 2008 at 2:31p.m.

The Northern Ohio Violent Fugitive Task Force will receive the U.S. Marshals Service Director’s Award for “Distinguished Group for Outstanding Fugitive Task Force” in Washington, D.C. on April 1.

The award is the highest honor the marshals service bestows upon its employees and law enforcement partners. The NOVFTF was the only fugitive task force selected in the nation, said U.S. Marshal Pete Elliott, based in Cleveland.

Elliott, who formed the task force in June 2003, said the unit has worked in collaboration with law enforcement agencies throughout the district to arrest fugitives and reached a milestone recently with its 15,000th arrest. The task force is comprised of 200 law enforcement officers from more than 60 agencies and has offices in Cleveland, Lorain, Akron, Toledo and Youngstown.

Elliott said the task force is one of the most successful in the United States due to the dedication of the men and women who go out on a daily basis to arrest the “worst of the worst.”

He said the task force’s wide-reaching grasp has nabbed fugitive across the nation, in Mexico and Panama and tracked fugitives as far as Israel. The marshals service has task forces in 86 of its 94 districts, with the NOVFTF consistently one of the leaders in apprehensions, he said.