A 31-year-old Lethbridge man is facing numerous charges including assaulting an officer, failing to stop for an officer, dangerous driving and possession of stolen property after he allegedly evaded police in a vehicle that had been reported stolen.
According to a Lethbridge Police Service (LPS) news release, officers responded to a report of a suspicious vehicle along Fairmont Point South on Nov. 29.
Police determined the Hyundai Sonata had previously been reported stolen, and officers recognized the driver as a man who is known to police.
The officer asked the driver to get out of the vehicle, but police say he put the Sonata into gear and drove away, “colliding with a parked police car and forcing the officer back in to avoid being run over.”
The LPS said the vehicle drove away at a high rate of speed, travelling the wrong way down the street and onto the sidewalk.
Police said officers later found the vehicle on Dec. 2 in a back alley.
That same day, police responded to another report of a suspicious vehicle parked in a back alley along the 1300 block of St. Arthur Road North “with a man passed out behind the wheel.”
The LPS said officers recognized the man as being the same person involved in the Nov. 29 incident.
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“The driver was still asleep with the keys in the ignition and, upon waking up, was removed from the vehicle,” police said.
That vehicle, a Chevrolet Malibu, was also reported stolen on Dec. 1.
Police said officers found the keys for the Hyundai Sonata on the man.
“As the driver displayed signs of impairment by street narcotics and a crack pipe and drug paraphernalia were recovered from the vehicle, he was assessed by a drug recognition expert and bodily fluid samples collected and forwarded to the RCMP lab for analysis,” police said in the Tuesday news release.
Michael Hahn, 31, of Lethbridge, is charged with two counts of possession of stolen property over $5,000, assaulting a peace officer with a weapon, dangerous driving, disqualified driving, driving an uninsured motor vehicle, operating a motor vehicle without a subsisting certificate of registration, failing to remain at the scene of a collision, failing to stop for a peace officer and two counts of breach of a recognizance.
Police said more charges are pending.
Hahn has been remanded in custody to appear in court Dec. 7.
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