A man charged for unlawful possession of guns and narcotics in December 2023 is back in custody at the Lewis County Jail after he posted bail, failed to return to court and evaded arrest for over a year.
His bail, which was initially set and posted at $25,000, is now set at $250,000.
Jeffrey Scott Coolidge, 47, of Tacoma, was initially arrested on Dec. 22, 2023, after officers with the Centralia Police Department found two firearms, 9.1 grams of powdered fentanyl, 100 to 150 fentanyl pills, 4.2 grams of a substance suspected to be meth or fentanyl and 98.7 grams of meth inside a vehicle he was occupying when he was arrested on an unrelated warrant for a vehicle prowl out of King County.
He was charged Dec. 26, 2023, with one count of possession of a controlled substance with intent to manufacture or deliver and two counts of second-degree unlawful possession of a firearm.
Coolidge’s bail was set at $25,000 at the time of his arrest, which he posted via a bail bond before his scheduled Dec. 27 preliminary hearing, according to court documents.
His defense attorney requested that the hearing be set over one day “due to Mr. Coolidge having car trouble,” and the hearing was continued to Dec. 28, according to court documents.
Coolidge failed to appear for that Dec. 28 hearing, prompting a judge to issue a no-bail bench warrant.
A deputy prosecutor noted for the record Dec. 28 that police had not frozen Coolidge’s bank account.
A hearing to quash the bench warrant was scheduled for Jan. 18, 2024, after Coolidge contacted court officials, but Coolidge also failed to appear at that hearing.
The no-bail bench warrant remained active until the Centralia Police Department arrested him at approximately 1:45 p.m. on Tuesday, March 25, 2025, according to court documents and jail records.
The bond company that posted Coolidge’s bail, Bad Boys Bail Bonds, issued a letter Jan. 18, 2024, stating that it was willing to reinstate Coolidge’s $25,000 Lewis County bond.
“I would not agree to that,” Deputy Prosecutor Joe Bassetti said during Coolidge’s preliminary hearing on Thursday, noting that Coolidge has been in warrant status for approximately a year and three months and asking for bail to be set at $250,000.
“I’m not sure the bail company at this point would agree to that either,” Judge Joely Yeager said of a bail reinstatement.
Yeager granted Bassetti’s request for $250,000 bail, citing community safety risks due to the alleged firearm possession and the high risk that Coolidge will again fail to appear if released.
“Both of those things warrant significant bail,” Yeager said Thursday.
