Crime & fire.
A man was arrested after allegedly leading police on a high-speed pursuit in a stolen vehicle that ended in a crash and a foot chase last week.
The incident began at 9:17 a.m. when a Bristol Township police officer received a notification for a stolen license plate on a blue Mazda3 traveling northbound on Route 13 from Veterans Highway.
The officer attempted to stop the vehicle near Bath Road and Lakeland Avenue, but the driver accelerated to a “high rate of speed,” police said.
During the chase, the Mazda bypassed a vehicle stopped at a red light to make a right turn onto Lakeland Avenue and disregarded the patrol car’s activated lights and sirens, police said.
After blowing through a stop sign at the intersection of Beaver Dam Road and Lakeland Avenue, the driver lost control and crashed into a fence and tree, police said.
Both the driver and a passenger fled the crash on foot.
Leland Joseph Leonard, 20, of Bristol Township’s Levittown section, ran along Beaver Dam Road and attempted to jump a fence on Marie Lowe Drive before being apprehended in a backyard, police said.
Police said the vehicle and the license plate had been reported stolen out of Hilltown Township in Upper Bucks County.
Leonard was charged with two counts of receiving stolen property and single counts of flight to avoid/trial/punishment, fleeing or attempting to elude an officer, and evading arrest or detention on foot. He was preliminarily arraigned before District Judge Terry Hughes and held on 10 percent of $100,000 bail.
Court records stated Leonard was previously sentenced in November by Bucks County Court of Common Pleas Judge Stephen Corr to probation for charges of harassment, disorderly conduct, and possession of drug paraphernalia stemming from a separate case in Bristol Township.
