Driver runs on foot after spike strips disable car

The chase: Lewiston to Winona

A Lewiston police officer trailed a car east out of town and lit his lights. A mile later the driver slowed but then sped off. This was at 5:21 p.m. at the crest of the Highway14 grade at Rolling Hills Road. Despite snow and ice on the highway, the driver sped down curvy Lewiston grade and whipped through the Arches at 60 mph. He slowed a bit through Stockton, at 57 mph in the 35 zone. Then up and over Stockton Hill and its two hairpin curves, then down onto Winona. The Lewiston deputy had pulled back because of road conditions but continued on the guy’s tail. On the way over Stockton Hill, the officer radioed the car’s registration to the Winona dispatcher, who phoned the owner. A woman answered. Yes, she said, it was her car. But, she added, her husband didn’t have permission to take it. The dispatcher alerted sheriff’s deputies and Winona and Goodview police. A spike strip was laid in the driver’s path. He steered around the spikes and turned south on Highway 61, then to a frontage road and back streets. He tore through the tree-lined Ronald Avenue residential neighborhood, then to Service Drive. He wound behind the Culver’s restaurant. At El Patron cantina he turned back onto Highway 61, made a U-turn. Now heading north, he encountered a a second set of spike strips. Suddenly he was down 10 mph in the median. He jumped out and ran across two lanes of traffic. A deputy leaped into the chase, shouting out to stop or be tasered.  The man didn’t stop. The foot chase continued into the crowded Hy-Vee parking lot, where among shoppers’ parked cars and grocery carts, the man lost his  already jagged stride. The deputy nabbed him, cuffed him, and took him to jail. The guy reeked of alcohol, the deputy said.