Man cited for driving in HOV lane with dummy "passenger"

Frustrated by the heavy traffic he encountered on his daily commute from Camano Island to Bellevue and back, a 33-year-old man created a "passenger" out of PVC pipe and plastic foam so he could zip along in the HOV lane.

Too bad he didn't think to belt his dummy in.

During Wednesday's afternoon rush hour, a State Patrol trooper patrolling northbound Interstate 405 spotted the flash of a dangling, metal buckle — a telltale sign that someone isn't wearing a seat belt — in a car driving in the HOV lane in front of him, said Trooper Christina Martin. As the trooper followed the 1987 Honda Civic, he realized the man in the passenger seat hadn't moved a muscle, Martin said.

When the trooper pulled the vehicle over just north of Highway 520, he quickly determined the passenger was a realistic-looking, homemade dummy. The driver, who was on his way home to Camano Island, told the trooper he'd been driving with the dummy in his passenger seat for a few days because he could no longer tolerate sitting in traffic, Martin said.

"His wife told him not to do it but he ignored her," she said.

The driver was issued a $124 infraction for driving in the HOV lane. The legless dummy — made with plastic piping, a plastic foam head, a bearded Halloween mask and dressed in a zip-up jacket and a baseball cap — was confiscated and booked into the State Patrol's evidence room.

Sara Jean Green: 206-515-5654 or sgreen@seattletimes.com