A driver who claimed he drank a bottle of anti-freeze and consumed a bottle of pills led deputies on a long, strange chase on North Whidbey and into Fidalgo Island that ended with a crash into a tree on the night of Aug. 21, according to court documents.

Prosecutors charged 27-year-old Andrew I. Newman, an Oak Harbor resident, in Island County Superior Court Oct. 7 with attempting to elude a pursuing police vehicle. If convicted of the charge, he could face from two to six months in jail under the standard sentencing range.

Newman was summoned to appear in court Oct. 27 for arraignment.

The incident began when a resident called 911 to report that a 2002 Dodge Grand Caravan was blocking Crosby Road. The caller reported that the driver, later identified as Newman, was slumped over with a cigarette in his hand but then drove off when approached, according to a report by a deputy with the Island County Sheriff’s Office. The caller drove behind the minivan on Oak Harbor Road when it suddenly stopped in the middle of the road before making a U-turn. As he was passing, Newman yelled out his window that he wanted to die in peace.

The report states that police are familiar with Newman, who carries a knife and has told officers that he would use the knife to force police to shoot him, the report states.

An Oak Harbor police officer followed Newman’s vehicle through the city but turned around after he drove north, according to the report. Several deputies then searched North Whidbey for Newman’s vehicle. One of the deputies eventually noticed that the vehicle was parked perpendicular to traffic, and blocking the road, on the north end of Deception Pass Bridge.

The deputy activated his overhead lights and told Newman to turn off the vehicle and unlock the door. But Newman, who appeared to be smoking a glass pipe, drove erratically back and forth, perpendicular to traffic, before speeding north from the bridge, nearly striking a stopped car, the report states.

The deputy caught up with the vehicle as it was backing into the boat ramp on Campbell Lake. Newman drove onto Campbell Lake Road with the deputy following, lights and sirens on. Newman passed a car in a no-passing zone and then suddenly stopped for no apparent reason, causing the deputy to read-end the minivan, the deputy wrote. The collision left a dent in Newman’s bumper and shoved the push bar on the deputy’s car into the grille.

Newman drove off erratically, weaving in the lane. He turned onto Sharpe Road then onto Taftson Road before proceeding onto Crater Lake Road, where he struck a tree in a “Y” in the roadway, the report states.

Several officers arrived at the scene and then initiative a “high-risk vehicle stop.” Newman became unresponsive, so the deputies broke a window, opened a door and pulled him out. He told officers that he drank an entire bottle of anti-freeze and took all his psych medicine at once; an ambulance took him to Island Hospital in Anacortes.

Deputies found a journal inside Newman’s vehicle in which the author wrote that his world was falling apart and he doesn’t know how to stop it.

“They express the need for God’s help and questioning why they keep doing this to themselves,” the report states, adding that the author questioned why “they hate themselves so much.”