A man who injured another driver during a hit-and-run crash in a rental car while trying to evade Berkeley police was arrested Tuesday morning after officers found him hiding on a roof, authorities said.
Berkeley Police spokeswoman Officer Jennifer Coats said police were called to the 2700 block of Ridge Road at 8:30 a.m. for a report of a man who was sleeping in his vehicle.
According to scanner traffic reviewed by Berkeleyside, someone spotted the man in a white sedan in the parking garage on the block. He was unresponsive but appeared to be breathing. Police sent an officer to check on the man to see if he was all right.
“As the officer contacted him, he provided a false number,” said Coats. “He suddenly started up the vehicle and fled.”
The officer did not pursue the vehicle. According to scanner recordings, police identified it as an Enterprise rental car that left the scene at a high rate of speed.
Within minutes, police got a report of an injury hit-and-run collision near Cedar Street and Euclid Avenue. Coats said that crash involved the vehicle of the man contacted on Ridge.
“Officers immediately flooded the area,” she said. Someone saw the man fleeing into a yard in the 2500 block of Cedar.
An officer spotted him and chased him into the 2500 block of Hill Court nearby, according to the scanner.
Police were able to find the man hiding on a roof, Coats said.
They challenged him at gunpoint, and were able to take him into custody, according to the scanner.
Coats said police identified the driver as 35-year-old Nicholas Boudreaux of Berkeley, a handyman.
He was arrested at about 8:40 a.m. on suspicion of felony hit and run causing injury, probation violation and several misdemeanors. The other driver was taken to a local hospital for treatment.
Boudreaux is no longer in custody but was scheduled for an attorney and plea hearing Friday morning, according to online records from the Alameda County sheriff’s office.
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