Post Falls man gets prison following felony DUI pursuit

A Post Falls man will spend 10 years in prison after being found guilty of felony DUI and felony eluding.

Daniel Joseph Ramage, 29, was sentenced Friday by District Judge Barry McHugh and will be eligible for parole after three years. Ramage also received a five-year driver’s license suspension following his release from prison. 

The charges stem from an incident on Nov. 28, when a Post Falls police officer observed Ramage cross the center and fog lines multiple times. 

The officer activated his emergency lights and attempted to initiate a traffic stop, but Ramage refused to pull over, according to a press release from the Kootenai County Prosecutor's Office. 

Instead, Ramage led the officer in a pursuit spanning several miles through a residential area and failed to stop at more than a dozen stop signs, the release said.

Ramage eventually stopped and was arrested. He displayed several signs of intoxication during the stop and was investigated for drunken driving, the release said.

During the investigation, Ramage refused to complete field sobriety evaluations and to provide a breath sample. After obtaining a search warrant, a sample of Ramage’s blood was collected, revealing a blood alcohol concentration of 0.282 — three and a half times the legal limit of 0.08.

Ramage’s criminal history consists of three prior convictions for DUI. Ramage was convicted of misdemeanor DUI twice in 2017 and felony DUI in 2021, the release said.

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, about 30% of traffic crash fatalities in the United States involve drunken drivers.