PORT ANGELES — A Port Angeles felon who found his name splattered across the Internet after a story about his brazen post-police-chase Facebook postings went viral on the World Wide Web was still on the loose Tuesday.
Travis A. Nicolaysen, 26, is wanted by the state Department of Corrections for parole violations, having failed to check in with his parole officer since January, and is a suspect in an assault on his girlfriend that occurred March 28.
Bryan Smith, Port Angeles deputy chief of police, promised it’s just a matter of time before Nicolaysen is brought in.
“There is no retirement plan for criminals,” he said.
Nicolaysen escaped officers during two foot chases April 4 in a residential neighborhood near Olympic Medical Center, with officers and a police dog tracking him from Caroline Street to the Waterfront Trail.
Since then, the story of his Facebook posts, which vividly outline the life and times of a petty criminal on the run, seem to have captured the world’s imagination.
On Monday, after the story of Nicolaysen’s postings, along with words of support and criticism from his Facebook friends, was published in the Peninsula Daily News, it was picked up by news outlets from London to India.
It also appeared in various forms and under several different bylines on websites ranging from msnbc.com to that of New York’s Daily News.
His Department of Corrections mug shot accompanied most Internet articles.
Whether his newfound fame will help or hurt Nicolaysen’s efforts to elude arrest remains to be seen.
Some aren’t very positive that he can evade capture much longer.
“Hope you have mileage coverage on your Nike’s,” one Port Angeles woman wrote on his Facebook page, and quoted the theme song from the television show “COPS.”
Attempts to contact Facebook for comments Tuesday were unsuccessful.
According to Facebook’s data-use policy, the social media site has some limited ability to trace users.
The policy states, in part, “We may share your information in response to a legal request (like a search warrant, court order or subpoena) if we have a good faith belief that the law requires us to do so.”
The posts that began last Thursday, the day after the failed manhunt, featured Nicolaysen’s Facebook status change from “in a relationship” to “single,” along with responses to some who warned that police were after him and others pleading that he turn himself in.
After the story ran Monday, however, Nicolaysen deleted Saturday’s discussion from his public Facebook page and hasn’t posted since.
Regional and national media coverage, including television newscasts, posted links to the page, however, and it has garnered hundreds of comments —including more than 700 entries on a religious debate attached to a photo in one of his public albums.
Posts on the site run the gamut from encouraging Nicolaysen to turn himself in to supporting him in his run and poking fun at police for their inability to catch him.
Posts allegedly from young women offer Nicolaysen their phone numbers and ask him to call.
They might rethink their offers knowing that Nicolaysen has been convicted of five felonies, police said.
Charges include domestic violence, residential burglary, theft of a firearm and court-order violations.
Nicolaysen stands 5 feet 7 inches tall and weighs about 150 pounds, the state Department of Corrections said.
He has long, wavy brown hair frequently worn in a braid or ponytail and tends to wear a mustache with a short, full beard or goatee, police said.
He also has a small teardrop tattoo under the outer corner of his left eye and tattoos on the left side of his neck, both forearms and both calves.
Anyone with information about Nicolaysen’s whereabouts is asked to phone the Port Angeles Police Department at 360-452-4545.
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Reporter Arwyn Rice can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5070, or at arwyn.rice@peninsuladailynews.com.
