Washington fugitive arrested after illegally parked car spotted at SLO gas station, police say
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A fugitive from Washington state was found and arrested in San Luis Obispo last week, according to police.
Forty-year-old Ronald James Hart of Elma, Washington, was contacted by the San Luis Obispo Police Department officers twice in recent weeks before being arrested and identified as a fugitive, police said in a post on Instagram.
First, on Nov. 20, officers contacted two males illegally parked in a disabled space at the Conserv Fuel gas station on Santa Rosa Street, police said.
One of the men — later discovered to be Hart, who at the time did not have any identification documents —provided multiple names to the officers and was ultimately cited on a misdemeanor for providing false identification to police, the release said.
Then on Wednesday, officers contacted Hart again on the 700 block of Foothill Boulevard, police said.
He again gave several false names and was arrested on felony suspicion of falsely impersonating another, the release said. That’s when they were able to identify Hart, according to the release.
At first, the San Luis Obispo Department said Hart was on the run after escaping a correctional facility in Washington. But Washington State Department of Corrections spokesperson Rachel Ericson, however, said Hart did not escape from a Washington Correctional facility.
Later Monday, the San Luis Obispo Police Department confirmed the discrepancy was due to a misinterpretation of the arrest warrant and that Hart had not escaped from a facility.
Rather, he had broken probation.
After his arrest, Hart was transported to San Luis Obispo County Jail and will be extradited to Washington, the news release said.
Hart was also charged with one misdemeanor, identifying information theft with intent to defraud and a felony for being a fugitive without an arrest warrant.
This last charge allows for Hart to be held in custody while awaiting extradition, the release said.
Suspect did not escape from Washington correctional facility, officials say
Ericson told The Tribune in an email that Hart had not escaped a Washington correctional facility.
Rather, she said, he was released on community supervision in December 2021, which meant “he was living in the community with certain requirements, such as checking in with his community corrections officer.”
Hart failed to report to his community corrections officer in late 2023, Ericson said, which prompted the Corrections Department to issue a warrant for his arrest.
According to Grays Harbor County Undersheriff Kevin Schrader, when the Department of Corrections issues an arrest warrant when a person fails to check in with community supervision, the warrant reads “escaped community custody,” which could have been misinterpreted to mean he escaped a correctional facility.
“If anyone escaped from a correctional facility I would know about it,” he said.
In a phone call, Ericson clarified that community supervision in Washington functions the same as parole or probation in California, which can sometimes draw confusion between states.
She also said Hart’s previous evading police charge used the term “escape” in the charge sheet, which may have added to the misinterpretation.
Washington fugitive has decades-long criminal history
According to Washington state court records, Hart was convicted of 13 crimes between 2002 and 2018. These included assault, criminal impersonation and evading police, Ericson said.
A domestic violence restraining order was also issued against him in 2007.
According to an August 2016 article from The Olympian, Hart was accused of speeding away from Thurston County sheriff’s deputies and ramming his Honda Civic into a pickup truck.
At the time of this arrest, Hart was also wanted on an outstanding Department of Corrections warrant, according to The Olympian.
At that time, Hart had at least 10 prior felony convictions, The Olympian reported.
Hart’s most recent conviction occurred in June 2018, when he pleaded guilty to a felony. Schrader told The Tribune this charge was drug-related.
The Washington state court case search system does not show what crimes defendants were charged with, only that it was an “adult criminal felony.”
For that crime, he was sentenced to 57 months in state prison and fined $800. If he served his entire sentence, he would have been released in 2022.
Suspect provided false identities, SLO Police say
According to San Luis Obispo Police Department public information officer Christine Wallace, one of the crimes Hart was detained in Washington on was identity theft.
Hart was arrested in San Luis Obispo on suspicion of identity theft after providing false identities to officers twice.
In conversations with police, Hart claimed to be at least two different people during his first interactions with local law enforcement and claimed even more identities in additional conversations, Wallace said.
After much elimination of false identities, officers were able to correctly identify Hart as a Washington fugitive, she said.
It was “good work by our detectives to find out who he was,” she said.
This story was originally published December 16, 2024 at 10:42 AM.
