TABOR, Iowa (KMTV) — A larger crowd than usual gathered for a Tabor City Council meeting Wednesday night centered on multiple allegations brought forward by a resident against the Fremont County sheriff and his son, the Tabor police chief.
Tabor resident Andy Hansen, who works for a different law enforcement agency, presented records to the council that he says call into question Police Chief Derek Aistrope's job performance. Hansen specifically pointed to a 2023 arson investigation that resulted in charges being dropped.
Hansen references a report made by Pottawattamie County Sheriff's Office Special Deputy Anthony Kava. His objective was to attempt to access video footage from a hard drive involved in that 2023 incident, that could be important in the investigation. According to Kava, he received a call from Chief Derek Aistrope on April 8, 2025.
"I advised that I believed additional recovery from the hard drive might be possible with the newer software. No further discussion occurred in 2025," Kava said in the report.
On Jan. 30, 2026 Kava reports obtaining a trial license for the newer software.
"I could see a fire in some clips and was able to determine approximately when that became visible, but I did not have exact times from any reporting nor a description of the suspect," Kava said in the report.
Kava reports that he texted Chief Derek Aistrope on Feb. 6.
"I advised in the text that the statute of limitations would be up next month (2026-03) and that, if it's still worth checking I could use a copy of the report with whatever specifics are available for times / descriptions," Kava said.
In Kava's report he notes that Chief Derek Aistrope said he would "send it when I get back," but did not receive any update.
While charges were filed on March 6 by Chief Derek Aistrope according to his report, the case was dismissed on March 10 due to the statute of limitations.
During the meeting, Hansen also accused Fremont County Sheriff Kevin Aistrope of making a phone call to him on March 18 while he was looking into the investigation.
"I reiterated that I was simply requesting public information. In response, he stated, Just so you know, I can be very vindictive as well," Hansen said.
I asked Sheriff Kevin Aistrope for a response to the accusations made during the meeting.
"Nope, there's some legal action going on and no comment until that gets taken care of," Sheriff Kevin Aistrope said.
This is not the first time the sheriff has defended his son at a city council meeting. In an audio recording I recovered from a meeting in March of last year, Kevin Aistrope can be heard addressing Mayor Devin Juel and the City Council following comments about his son's performance.
"You don't know what law enforcement's about. You don't have a clue," Kevin Aistrope said.
During that meeting on March 12, a conversation over an hour long took place after Juel brought up complaints he says he had received from neighbors in Tabor. These alleged complaints ranged in topic from Chief Derek Aistrope wearing improper equipment when responding to calls to receiving calls on his personal cell phone that were improperly documented.
I spoke with Juel about Chief Derek Aistrope's job performance over the past year.
"So it's always difficult. We're a department of one. There's a lot on him. As Andy mentioned, there's a big cost associated with those items, and being a small town in Iowa, we don't necessarily have the funds," Juel said.
I tried reaching Chief Derek Aistrope on Thursday April 23 the day after Hansen's comments at the City Council meeting but did not receive a response.
After about 15 minutes of addressing the council, Hansen called for an independent investigator and asked the council to review its oversight of the police department.
"Yeah, I mean obviously we have to take that information and review how we want things handled and what we need to do moving forward," Juel said.
Following a long conversation, Hansen said he hopes the meeting is enough to spark the change he wants to see.
Note: Some versions of this story that aired on KMTV newscasts between 04/22/2026 and 04/23/2026 included an error. The name Petersen was mentioned instead of Hansen. The video attached to this story is accurate.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
