TULALIP — The Lake Stevens man reportedly bragged to his girlfriend about “always being able to outrun law enforcement.”
Just days before he allegedly rammed a deputy’s patrol car and led law enforcement on a New Year’s Eve chase, the 30-year-old man had hit a Tulalip officer’s vehicle, according to police reports.
The Tulalip officer reportedly saw the man Dec. 19, slumped over in the driver’s seat of a BMW 325. In his lap was a piece of aluminum foil with burn marks on it, a sign that he may have been using heroin.
According to court papers, the officer moved his car to block in the BMW, then ordered the man to step out of the vehicle.
The officer repeated the command several times before the suspect got out.
After he was searched for weapons, the man jumped back in the driver’s seat, hit the gas pedal and struck the officer’s patrol car as he escaped.
The front bumper of the suspect’s car fell off — the same bumper that would be reported missing when he encountered a sheriff’s deputy on New Year’s Eve.
In that incident, the deputy attempted to pull the man over around 5:30 p.m. on Gibson Road when a license check identified the suspect’s car as stolen.
“I heard the engine of the BMW revving and the driver looked right at me and intentionally drove the vehicle into the left front of my patrol vehicle,” the deputy wrote.
The suspect allegedly drove over the speed limit and blew through stop lights as he made his way to I-5.
Once on the freeway, he drove the wrong way in the southbound lanes, causing deputies to call off the pursuit.
Law enforcement picked up the chase when the suspect was spotted at a weigh station, but had to terminate the pursuit once more when the man reportedly drove against traffic again.
This time, they lost sight of the suspect for good.
They caught up with him Jan. 8 at a motel near SeaTac and booked him into the Snohomish County Jail for investigation of possession of a stolen vehicle, attempting to elude, third-degree assault and a felony warrant.
He remained in custody Friday with bail set at $100,000.
Zachariah Bryan: 425-339-3431; zbryan@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @zachariahtb.
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