We have more information about the arrest of 71-year-old Robert Edward Dillen.
Bartow County deputies went to his residence on the northeast corner of Sugar Valley Road and Laurel Drive west of Cartersville on Tuesday morning to serve two arrest warrants for the sexual exploitation of children.
One of the warrants said that between August 8th, 2022, and February 21st, 2023, at his residence on Sugar Valley Road, Dillen committed the offense of sexual exploitation of children by knowingly and willfully having in his possession a video that depicts a minor engaged in sexually explicit conduct. Law enforcement reportedly extracted the video from a hard drive device.
When a deputy told him he was returning to jail, Dillen reportedly stepped back, slammed the door, and locked it.
While backup deputies were arriving, Dillen purportedly called 911, saying he wasn’t going back to jail and that they were going to have to kill him. SWAT responded to the scene.
Meanwhile, Dillen told a negotiator over the phone that the circumstances around the prior warrant were false and named a man who knows the juvenile victim as the guilty party.
He eventually gave up, exited the residence unarmed, and law enforcement arrested him.
After the incident, the BCSO also charged Robert Dillen with obstructing a law enforcement officer.
Bartow County deputies booked him into the jail on August 9th, 2022, for one count of false imprisonment, one count of rape, five counts of child molestation, two counts of enticing children for indecent purposes, one count of terroristic threats and acts, and one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. A court granted him a motion for a bond reduction earlier this year, and he got out on June 7th on a $30,000 bond.
Thus far, a court has not offered a bond regarding the charges he received on Tuesday.