Police: Man arrested after fleeing Apollo break-in, eluding cops a 2nd time, feigning suicide

A man accused of fleeing from police twice in two days and then feigning suicide to avoid capture has been ordered to stand trial.

Frank Dean Shaner, 23, of the 700 block of Stewart Drive in Washington Township was charged June 12 with felony counts of criminal trespass and flight to avoid apprehension, along with counts of corruption of minors, resisting arrest and evading arrest.

Shaner was being detained in the Armstrong County Jail in lieu of a $100,000 cash bond, according to court records.

He waived his right to a preliminary hearing June 15 before District Judge James Andring, who ordered him to stand trial on the charges in Armstrong County Court.

Police wrote in Shaner’s arrest papers that an Apollo patrol officer got a report about two men trying to break into the old high school building shortly before 9 p.m. June 8.

A responding officer found a broken window on the North Pennsylvania Avenue side of the building and heard people talking inside as he approached.

Two males inside the former school’s wood shop were ordered to climb back out through the window but fled on foot when the officer began questioning them, according to a criminal complaint.

Other officers were called to the scene, but the suspects weren’t found, police said.

Investigators were able to identify Shaner as one of the people in the building, and an officer spotted him two days later ducking into a porch in the 500 block of Terrace Avenue, the complaint said.

The officer circled the block and saw Shaner at the intersection of North Fifth Street and Jamison Way, and Shaner once again ran off to elude capture, police said.

A woman who lived nearby told police that Shaner was staying with his girlfriend at the home on Terrace Avenue where he was seen, according to the complaint.

Police identified the second suspect as a 16-year-old boy after his grandmother called the police station and asked whether they were looking for Shaner, the complaint said.

The woman said Shaner contacted her and said police were chasing him but he didn’t know why. She told police she declined his request to drive him to New Kensington, the complaint said.

The woman told police the other person they were looking for was “probably her grandson” and gave them his address and the names of his mother and stepfather, according to the complaint.

When an officer questioned the teen, he told them that he ran from police because “you got handcuffs out,” the complaint said.

On June 11, police began tracking a “rumor on the street” that Shaner ended his own life, but they were unable to verify the information, the complaint said.

While a state trooper was heading to the home on Terrace Avenue to do a welfare check, an officer from Kiski Township reported seeing Shaner walking along Railroad Street, the complaint said.

Shaner was taken into custody and transported to ACMH Hospital in Kittanning for a mental health evaluation after a trooper found blood in the home where he was staying, according to investigators.

The following day, Shaner was released from the hospital and arrested after a physician determined that while he had cut his wrists, he was not suicidal, according to his arrest papers.

The charges were filed after police consulted with an Armstrong County assistant district attorney.