Thurston County K9 drags suspect from under a deck after a brief chase
By: -----
Thurston County, WA - A police dog helped take a male suspect into custody early Saturday morning, according to Thurston County Sheriff Derek Sanders.
In a social media post, Sanders said a resident flagged down a deputy and his police dog, telling the deputy there was an armed drug dealer driving around west Olympia.
A short time later, according to Sanders, the deputy tried to conduct a traffic stop on a vehicle with tabs that expired in 2022, but the driver drove away from the deputy.
It was not immediately clear if the resident’s tip and the vehicle with expired tabs were connected; however, a pursuit was initiated, Sanders said.
The driver fled at speeds of 100 miles per hour near The Evergreen State College, slid into a tree in a nearby neighborhood, left the car and ran, according to Sanders.
“K9 Igo found the driver hiding under a deck,” he wrote. “Despite numerous K9 warnings to crawl out, the suspect refused and instead chose to ignore our commands and dig through his pockets and waistband.”
The dog was deployed, and he extracted the suspect from under the deck, according to Sanders.
Once in custody, deputies obtained a search warrant to search the suspect vehicle and found a loaded .357 Magnum handgun.
Sanders said the suspect was treated for minor injuries from the dog bite and booked into the Thurston County Jail for attempting to elude, unlawful possession of a firearm, and hit-and-run.