A Warsaw man was arrested early Tuesday after reportedly crashing his car into several utility poles and leaving the scene, running through yards and wooded areas and hiding from police dogs in a tree stand. Police were called just before 4 a.m. Tuesday to a crash scene at CR 175E at 8 Square Road, near the Suburban Acres Trailer Court, Warsaw, where a 2008 Honda Civic had gone off the roadway at a curve in the road and slammed into at least two utility poles, bringing down electrical wires and badly damaging the poles. Kosciusko County Sheriff’s deputies arrived to find the vehicle abandoned. Police K-9s were brought in to search for the driver, and the dogs searched the area for more than four hours as calls flooded police dispatch with reports of a man running in the area, according to the Kosciusko County Sheriff’s Department. Sheriff’s department spokesman Chad Hill said one caller reported a man came out of a wooded area and, when questioned by the caller, said he was mushroom hunting before he went back into the woods. Another caller said a man was seen running through his property, and another reported a man running down a road. Police found 28-year-old Andrew Dale Ward Kline, of 65 EMS C29 Lane, Warsaw, and took him into custody. He was booked into Kosciusko County Jail on a preliminary charge of leaving the scene of a property-damage accident. He has since been released after posting a $300 bond. According to the sheriff’s department, Kline admitted to crashing the Civic, and climbing into and hiding in a tree stand to avoid detection by the K-9s. Hill said Kline also admitted to driving the Civic while drunk at the time of the crash. That admission, along with the crash severity and the damage to the utility poles, has prompted the Kosciusko County Prosecutor’s Office to file a driving while intoxicated charge despite the inability to test the man’s blood for alcohol due to the length of time between the crash and his arrest.
