MONROE — On Feb.**** 5 at around 8:30 p.m., Monroe Police arrested the man who was in a police pursuit around Monroe and prompted a near-two-hour manhunt overnight in the Fryelands Friday, Jan. 24.
Officers had a reasonably good idea when they knocked on the door on Esther Avenue that they’d be seeing the driver who led them on a tour through town, part of it with the SUV riding its rims after spike strips blew out the tires.
“It’s the person we thought it was,” Monroe Police Cmdr. Paul Ryan said.
The man faces a felony charge of eluding law enforcement which a judge agreed. District Court Judge Anthony Howard dismissed charges police sought of gross misdemeanors of reckless driving and obstructing a law enforcement officer. The reckless driving charge was because he recklessly passed cars on the road.
His bail is $7,500.
The arrest took 12 days to complete. The police report shows officers couldn’t immediately find the man.
In a twist, though, four days after the chase, the man called 911 saying his SUV was stolen, and agreed to come to the police station to fill out a stolen vehicle report. He was its registered owner. Police had impounded it.
Part of the investigation took time because officers had to figure out if his stolen vehicle story was true. During the chase, though, the man they saw behind the wheel sure looked the same.
“In that time, we were investigating and we were building a case that ensures accountability,” Ryan said.
It all began when the driver fled from a Snohomish Police deputy who used a stop sign violation to do a traffic stop. Police wanted to talk with the driver after seeing him parked after-hours at the Snohomish Library, but he left, the police report said.
He took the Old Snohomish-Monroe Road and upon entering Monroe local police began a pursuit. He went back to Snohomish on the Old Snohomish-Monroe Road, and then took U.S. 2 to cut back to Monroe before leading police on a winding chase largely through residential streets in neighborhoods in the Fryelands.
Police called off the chase after successfully flinging and sticking a GPS tracker onto the Yukon. The man abandoned the Yukon close to his house and couldn’t be found.
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CORRECTION -- The earlier version of this story had the wrong month for the arrest over the January 24 chase. The arrest was on February 5, not January 5. The Tribune regrets the error.
