LYNNWOOD, WA – A suspected DUI driver was arrested after allegedly abandoning his son in a box truck shortly before it crashed near Interstate 5 in Lynnwood on Saturday, reports The Herald Net.
Police say the suspect, a 36-year-old man from Mountlake Terrace, was driving a white Ford box truck along 164th Street SW toward the entrance ramp to I-5 south at about 4:30 p.m when he bailed out of the vehicle. The truck continued moving before rolling down a 5- to 10-foot embankment with his son still inside.
The driver then fled on foot before his ex-wife, who was in a separate vehicle, stopped him and drove him back to the scene before police arrived.
When asked why he left his son to crash, the man told troopers he had not been thinking clearly. The suspect displayed multiple signs of impairment, including bleary eyes, slurred speech, and an odor of marijuana. He admitted to smoking marijuana earlier and consented to a field sobriety test in which he collapsed to the ground, claiming his back was hurt in the incident.
The suspect was taken to a nearby hospital but later released and arrested for investigation of DUI, hit-and-run, reckless endangerment and abandonment of a dependent person. As of Wednesday, he remained at Snohomish County Jail.
The boy was transported to Swedish Edmonds Hospital for minor injuries sustained in the crash.
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