Life in Union County is generally uneventful, peaceful.

Now, Chief Deputy Tom Morgan said, people are wondering if they can go jogging and are questioning just how aware they need to be.

“There’s obviously a level of fear in the community right now,” Morgan said.

Two incidents have people on edge. One was the abduction and rape of a Union County woman whose vehicle was stopped Feb. 4 on Paver Barnes Road. The second involved a man who pleaded no contest last week to impersonating a police officer after Marysville police received complaints from two women who said he had followed them through the Mill Valley subdivision.

Union County Sheriff Jamie Patton said the rape is not related to the other two incidents.

The woman who was assaulted told authorities last week a truck with mounted lights resembling those used on a law enforcement vehicle pulled her over on Paver Barnes Road the afternoon of Friday, Feb. 4. She said a man forced her to get into his truck while a second man drove her vehicle away. She said she was taken to another location and sexually assaulted by the first man. The second suspect drove her car to the where she was assaulted She was released seven hours later and drove herself to the hospital.

Patton wants to make it clear that the suspects in this case did not “impersonate” law enforcement.

“The lights she recalls in the grill ... is the only thing that is remotely close to a police vehicle,” he said. “It’s a truck. It’s not even an unmarked car that police would really use. He definitely wasn’t dressed as a police officer or a detective.”

The sheriff’s department released a sketch of one of the suspects on Tuesday, Feb. 7. He is a white man with pale skin, about 20 to 25 years old. He is about 6 feet tall and thin. He has dark hair, dark eyes, and a dark goatee and moustache. At the time of the assault, he was wearing a green John Deere ball cap with a square bill.

He wore a green Carhartt jacket with a tan, corduroy collar, and a black-and-white check shirt with blue jeans.

The second suspect is a white man about the same age but with a heavier build. He also wore a ball cap with a square bill.

“At last count, there were 15-20 tips that came in since the sketch went out to media outlets,” Patton said. “We also have some evidence at the lab being processed.”

Morgan said officers are still piecing together the events of the evening and determining what the second suspect was doing throughout the woman’s ordeal.

“That’s part of what we’re trying to establish between the time of the abduction and the time she came to the emergency room — what all took place during that time period,” he said.

Investigators are unsure if the suspects are from the area.

“We don’t know,” Morgan said. “All we have is the description. You could draw some conclusion that the abduction occurred in the county and the sexual assault was in the south end of the county but that’s all we have to go on.”

The victim said the truck is an older model extended-cab pickup truck, possibly a Chevrolet. It is white with a two-foot black stripe. It has some type of red and blue flashing lights in the front grill or headlight area.

In the Mill Valley incident, Marysville police arrested a 37-year-old Marysville man shortly before 2 a.m. on Feb. 7 after two women reported a man had been following them through the subdivision.

Lee L. Caspari is serving a 90-day sentence in the Tri-County Jail after

pleading no contest to charges of impersonating a police officer and aggravated menacing.

One woman said he pulled up behind her as she stopped at a house and approached her car in a manner much like a police officer conducting a traffic stop. She said she drove away when he asked her if he scared her. She contacted a police officer to report the incident.

Soon afterward, a second woman reported being followed. She told police that as she pulled over, Caspari pointed at her then at his eyes in a motion to indicate he was watching her. She immediately called 911 and as she left the scene, a responding officer stopped the vehicle that was driven by a man later identified as Caspari

“Because the Marysville case was so similar to this case, there was a lot of assumptions that this was an unmarked car or this was a person impersonating a police officer,” Patton said.

He said sheriff’s deputies do not conduct traffic stops with unmarked cars

“By law, can we stop with unmarked cars? Yes,” he said. “We can’t go out and primarily work traffic with an unmarked car because Ohio law states you have to be in a fully marked car with a light bar. There’s been so much attention to these types of situations over the years that we stay away from that as much as possible.”

Patton advised motorists to be observant to make sure whoever is attempting to pull over their cars is an officer.

“You need to be looking,” he said. “What type of car is it? What are the markings, if you can see markings? If it’s a remote, rural area, try to drive to some light. But you want to be careful with not pulling over because then you get into some issues of failure to yield for an emergency vehicle or stopping for an emergency vehicle.”

If there’s any question about the legitimacy of the person making the traffic stop, Patton advised calling 911 to report the situation.

Anyone with information involving the Paver Barnes Road abduction should call the Union County Sheriff’s Department at (937) 645-4110.