Steven Carl Drake

One suspect was arrested Thursday after a driver allegedly led Douglas County sheriff’s deputies on an early-morning chase across Lawrence.

The suspect, Steven Carl Drake, 46, of Lawrence, was arrested on suspicion of assault on a law enforcement officer, criminal damage to property, attempt to elude, driving while suspended and distribution of an opiate, according to the jail booking log.

Around 5:45 a.m., a deputy tried to stop a vehicle in a residential area near Ninth and Kentucky streets, but the vehicle fled the scene. The driver headed north over the Kansas River Bridge into North Lawrence, nearly striking an assisting Lawrence Police vehicle, sheriff’s office spokesman George Diepenbrock said.

The driver then doubled back over the river and onto southbound Tennessee Street before turning at Eleventh Street and then onto Kentucky Street, traveling in the wrong direction on the one-way street. A deputy watched as the car tried to turn again at the 2100 block of Kentucky Street but missed the turn and instead hit two parked cars and a shed, Diepenbrock said. When the driver attempted to reverse out of the wreck, deputies blocked the car’s escape with their patrol vehicles.

The suspect was arrested and taken to an area hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening, Diepenbrock said.

Drake was booked into jail later Thursday morning.

Drake was discharged from prison in May 2020. He has a long criminal history in Douglas and Jefferson counties, with convictions for forgery, assault, theft, child endangerment and a variety of driving-related offenses.

The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office asks anyone who witnessed the pursuit or had to avoid a collision as a result to contact the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office at 785-843-0250.