EARLIER: Deputy intoxicated when violence erupted at home, investigators allege
A Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office spokeswoman said Monday that Gearhart resigned from the organization. Gearhart’s resignation was effective March 20, according to a personnel order.
“Dear Sheriff, Please accept this letter as my formal notice as resignation from the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office as (Deputy) Sheriff, effective March 20, 2017,” Gearhart wrote in a one-paragraph letter. “I (thoroughly) enjoyed my tenure here and thank you for the opportunity that was given to my family and I. Respectfully Submitted, Douglas Gearhart.”
EARLIER: Deputy was served protection order against ex-wife
Gearhart was allegedly intoxicated Feb. 14 when he fought with his step-daughters and wife, who lost three teeth during the incident. Montgomery County had said Gearhart was on unpaid leave.
A police incident report said surveillance footage from inside Gearhart’s Franklin Twp. home showed him grabbing his wife, dragging her by the hair through the kitchen and slamming her head onto the edge of the kitchen island.
The report also said 911 calls came from Gearhart’s residence indicated that Gearhart returned home intoxicated and “was hitting everyone in the house.”
EARLIER: Montgomery County deputy on unpaid leave for Warren County case
“Our step-dad is beating our mom right now,” one 911 caller told a dispatcher at about 6:40 p.m. “Oh my gosh, I knew this was going to happen.”
Gearhart’s wife was found on the floor of the garage and her teeth were later collected and put into a cup of water. A woman is heard on the other 911 call crying and saying, “I’m sorry” as her daughters try to comfort her.
Interviews with both Gearhart and his wife show the couple and his mother spent all day at Miami Valley Gaming and that alcohol was consumed. Gearhart’s mother drove the couple home.
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One 911 caller said, “My step-dad came home drunk and he just hit me, my sister and my mom” and that there’s a “camera in the living room that caught it all.”
Gearhart was apprehended by Warren County Sheriff’s deputies after driving away from his residence. He told a deputy that all deputies did in Warren County was “drive around in a (expletive) cornfield.”
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The report said Gearhart said the Warren County deputy was a joke and that he should work in Drexel (in Jefferson Twp.) — because he had saved three people’s lives — if he wanted to learn “what it was all about.”
Deputies then collected Gearhart’s service weapon and badge from his residence.