Alumni spotlight: Appellate Technologies, Chase Lawson, and fixing the police-towing blindspot

Chase Lawson, co-founder of Appellate Technologies, during a Fuel AI/ML cohort session in Bentonville.

When a car gets towed at police direction, the driver is usually at the mercy of whoever shows up. Chase Lawson spent years watching that play out. As a Delaware State Trooper, he saw a workflow still running on paper forms, phone calls, and disconnected systems, with little oversight of the tow contractors police depend on.

“Those gaps could create risk for officers, agencies, tow operators, and the public,” Lawson said. With roughly 18,000 state and local law enforcement agencies in the country, he came to see towing and vehicle custody as a piece of national infrastructure that had gone unmanaged for decades.

Appellate, the company he cofounded in 2024, builds AI-enabled software for public safety, starting with that towing workflow. Its platform, ASTRO, is what Lawson has called “the Uber for police towing”: an officer requests a tow in the app, the job dispatches to the nearest partner, the owner gets text updates, the tow company documents the vehicle with photos, and every step is checked against the pricing rules most drivers never knew protected them.

At Fuel, where Appellate joined the 2025 AI/ML cohort, the biggest gains came in how Lawson pitches the company. “Before Fuel, I could explain the problem because I had lived it,” he said. “The program taught me how to structure the case: establish the pain, validate the market, define the wedge, and make the larger opportunity immediately understandable.” He credits the cohort with sharpening how he talks to police executives, partners, and investors.

That discipline is showing up in traction. Appellate is now live with the Beverly Hills Police Department, working with several more agencies in key markets, and advancing a $3M+ opportunity with a major county law enforcement agency. The team is also building a new AI-enabled compliance product for vendor eligibility and oversight, and is closing its seed round.

Lawson came back to Bentonville in June for MentorCamp NWA. “I honestly received as much as I contributed,” he said. “The candid feedback on market validation, go-to-market, and scaling came from people who had actually built and led companies.”

Ask him what he would tell a founder weighing an application, and he does not hesitate. “Apply. Fuel’s value is not confined to the formal program; it comes from the Fuel team, its mentor network, and founders from past cohorts who stay genuinely willing to help. That network helped me reach high-value decision-makers, sharpen our go-to-market, and make real headway on fundraising faster than I could have anywhere else.”

Fuel’s Fall 2026 AI/ML cohort takes the stage at Showcase Day on Wednesday, Oct. 28 at The Record in downtown Bentonville. Appellate is looking for introductions to public-safety leaders, GovTech and AI investors, and strong technical talent; if you can help, reach the Fuel team and we will connect you.