Man With 3 Priors Accused of Fleeing Police, Driving With .19 BAC

A man with three prior alcohol-related convictions faces felony DWI charges after he allegedly drove and ran away from , before testing and registering a blood-alcohol concentration of more than twice the legal limit.

Nathaniel James Johnson, 24, of Rosemount, is charged with two felony counts of first-degree driving while impaired, one gross misdemeanor count of driving after license cancelation and one misdemeanor count of fleeing police. The maximum combined penalty for the charges is 15 years, 3 months in prison and a $32,000 fine.

According to the criminal complaint, a police officer on patrol on May 11 saw a vehicle fail to stop at a stop sign at Flagstaff Avenue and 164th Street West.

The officer tried to pull over the vehicle, which allegedly sped up and continued driving south before pulling over, the complaint says.

The driver, later identified as Johnson, got out of the vehicle and started running south on Flagstaff, the complaint says. When police caught him, they allegedly smelled alcohol on Johnson and noticed his speech was "mumbled" as he tried to fight and pull off the handcuffs.

Johnson agreed to a breath test, the complaint says, which registered a 0.19 BAC.

Johnson was convicted of gross misdemeanor criminal vehicular homicide or operation with a BAC of 0.08 or more in Rice County in 2009; second-degree DWI at a 0.24 BAC in Dakota County in 2007; and fourth-degree DWI at a 0.15 BAC in Dakota County in 2004, court records show.