Cody Lee Miller, the man who climbed a tree in downtown Seattle and refused to come down for a day, refused to come to court Thursday afternoon.
For 25 hours, police say Cody Lee Miller refused to climb down from a towering sequoia tree in downtown Seattle.
On Thursday afternoon, he refused to come down from his cell at the King County Jail for a bail hearing.
Nevertheless, a King County District Court judge found probable cause to hold Miller, 28, for investigation of malicious mischief. His bail hearing was rescheduled for Friday.
Miller was arrested Wednesday after he clambered down from the tree outside the downtown Macy’s after spending the night in a makeshift nest of branches.
Most Read Local Stories
Police and firefighters responded to Stewart Street and Third Avenue around 11:20 a.m. Tuesday after the man, later identified by police as Miller, threw an apple at someone and then climbed about 70 feet up the sequoia tree in a street median.
Related story: #ManInTree: Why it went viral
From the archive: Seattle's big sequoia has struggled to stay alive — long before a man began plucking branches from its crown.
Editorial: Compassion, not wisecracks, for the man in the tree
From there, he threw green seed cones and branches he’d ripped from the tree, prosecutors alleged in the certificate of probable cause. The police report also said he threatened to throw feces.
Several passers-by and cars were hit by the cones, police said, and one officer suffered a cut on the ear from a “rock hard” cone, court documents say.
Police said the man claimed to be carrying a knife.
During the ensuing 25 hours, the man ignored police negotiators, drew a large crowd of onlookers and earned an Internet following as #ManInTree.
According to Seattle police, Miller had been arrested a few days earlier for sitting on the sidewalk in front of a Starbucks on East Pike Street in violation of a city ordinance.
“The subject began to rant about being harassed and his constitutional rights being violated,” a police officer wrote in his report.
Miller gave police a name that could not be verified He ultimately told the officer his name was “Edward Cullen,” a vampire character from the “Twilight” movies. He was arrested for providing a false identity, police said.
When released from the East Precinct, police said Miller told officers he had considered reaching for a folding knife he had concealed in his pocket and “fighting it out with police,” but said he wasn’t sure if that was the day he was going to die.
Miller has also lived in Alaska and Oregon, where he has a criminal record.
A spokeswoman with the Oregon Department of Corrections offender information center said Miller was sentenced to probation for two counts of assaulting an officer and a felony involving a weapon in 2013. Since then, he has violated the terms of his probation numerous times and was incarcerated from November 2014 to August 2015, she said.
James Custis, of Oregon, who was once married to Miller’s stepmother and remains close to Miller’s father, said he’s known Miller since Miller was about 8 years old.
Custis said Miller was diagnosed with a mental illness about 10 years ago and that his family tried many times to get him treatment.
“It’s awfully tough, though,” he said, “ to get someone help if they don’t want it.”
Meanwhile, the Seattle Department of Transportation, which employs the city’s arborist, planned to meet with the media Thursday afternoon to discuss its inspection of the tree, which was damaged during the standoff. Damage has been estimated at $7,800, according to an affidavit of probable cause outlining the police case against Miller.