A parolee who fled a traffic stop on Shelter Island and led officers on a pursuit, in which his car collided with a Harbor Police patrol vehicle, pleaded guilty Wednesday to assault with a deadly weapon on a peace officer.
Andrew Dwight Sigsbee — who admitted that he used his car as a dangerous weapon — will be sentenced to five years in state prison on Feb. 7. He also agreed to a lifetime ban on driving.
San Diego Harbor Police personnel spotted Sigsbee driving erratically near America’s Cup Harbor shortly after 5:30 a.m. last Oct. 2 and tried to pull him over, according to the port law enforcement agency.
Sigsbee, 32, refused to yield, fleeing to the east past Lindbergh Field and south toward the San Diego Convention Center.
The chase ended in the 1200 block of Harbor Drive, near Waterfront Park, after Frisbee’s vehicle ran over spike strips laid out in the roadway by San Diego police.
Sigsbee initially ignored officers’ commands to surrender, resulting in a brief standoff. After SD officers shot pepper-spray projectiles into his sedan, he exited the car and surrendered.
The Harbor police officer involved in the collision with the suspect’s car was taken to a hospital for treatment of minor injuries.
Sigsbee would have faced up to eight years and eight months in prison if convicted of assault with a deadly weapon and evading with reckless driving. He pleaded guilty on the day his preliminary hearing was supposed to go forward.
— City News Service