WINONA, Minn. — Police arrested a Houston County driver in a car reported stolen in Lakeville and was caught entering Winona on a license-plate reading device. Arrested was Austin Brian Grothe, age 20, of Houston. It turned that Grothe was wanted also on an arrest warrant from Olmsted County, police said. A Winona officer spotted the vehicle about 4:55 p.m. at Sarnia and Main streets and made the stop a couple blocks away. Apparently the vehicle had been driven 120 miles in Lakeville in Dakota County. The vehicle crossed the Winona city limits at an arterial equipped with a pole-mounted Flock license-plate reader. These readers comprise a latter-day moat on the city’s perimeter. The Flock system alerts local police dispatchers to vehicles that have been logged by police, even far way, as suspect in a cerine.
Grothe. Path included Dakota, Houston and Winona counties.