EVERETT — A Snohomish County sheriff’s deputy chased a man in a stolen car onto I-5 going the wrong way Wednesday night, officials said.
The pursuit ended with a head-on crash that sent the suspect and a Bothell woman to the hospital, Washington State Patrol Sgt. Kirk Rudeen said.
Neither injury was serious. The Everett man, 24, was treated at Providence Everett Medical Center before being booked into the Snohomish County Jail. The woman, 53, also was treated and released, hospital officials said.
A Washington State Patrol investigation into the chase now is under way.
The sheriff’s office asked the State Patrol to investigate in part because the state freeway falls under the patrol’s jurisdiction, sheriff’s spokeswoman Rebecca Hover said.
The patrol investigation also may determine if the deputy acted appropriately in pursuing the driver against traffic on I-5.
Although the sheriff’s office’s pursuit policy doesn’t specifically forbid chasing suspects the wrong way on the freeway, “It’s fair to say it would be greatly discouraged,” Hover said.
The incident will be reviewed by the sheriff’s office chain of command once the State Patrol investigation is complete, she said.
Police pursuits often are controversial. Officers must weigh the danger of the offense with the inherent risks of chasing a suspect, often at high speeds. Each year, about 400 people die nationwide as a result of pursuits, and not all deaths are of suspects.
On March 28, a sheriff’s office pursuit near Snohomish ended when an 18-year-old Marysville man’s car left the road and struck a tree. The teenager died. The deputy had attempted a police maneuver where an officer nudges the back of a car to get it to spin out and stall. It’s not clear if the deputy’s patrol car made contact with the teen’s car. That incident remains under investigation.
Wednesday night’s chase began just before 10 p.m. when Everett police spotted a reportedly stolen car near the intersection of Evergreen Way and Everett Mall Way, Everett police Sgt. Robert Goetz said.
Officers radioed ahead for spike strips to be placed in the path of the driver before trying to pull him over in case he tried to get away, Goetz said. When officers turned on lights and sirens, the man took off. He hit the spike strips but kept going.
Everett officers didn’t give chase. The man continued onto I-5, Goetz said. He began to drive onto the northbound I-5 onramp and then shot across the grassy median to enter the freeway from the wrong direction.
That’s about when a Snohomish County sheriff’s deputy started chasing the suspect.
The chase went about a half mile against traffic along the southbound lanes, stretching from the Everett Mall interchange north to the 75th Street SE overpass. It ended with the head-on crash in the carpool lane, Rudeen said.
The freeway was closed for several hours so detectives could collect evidence.
There was another wrong-way freeway chase in the county on March 18. A man fled Mountlake Terrace police by driving the wrong way onto I-5. In that case, officers broke off the chase and kept an eye on the driver by pacing his car along with the flow of traffic from the comparative safety of the adjacent lanes. The suspect initially escaped but was identified and later arrested.
Investigators have released few details about Wednesday night’s chase on the freeway and provided no information on the speeds involved. They believe two of the suspect’s tires were flattened by the spike strips, Rudeen said.
The man was jailed for investigation of possession of a stolen vehicle and attempting to elude police.
Until Tuesday, he’d been jailed on a similar charge stemming from an April 4 arrest. A judge ordered him released without bail.
The man also was arrested in February by Everett police for possession of a stolen vehicle, Goetz said.
Everett police don’t know who was at the wheel of the reportedly stolen car when they tried to stop it Wednesday, he said.
The man is scheduled today to make his first court appearance regarding Wednesday night’s pursuit.
Reporter Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437 or jholtz@heraldnet.com.
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