Patrol-logoThe Iowa State Patrol is releasing more details now about a weekend motorcycle chase in southwest Iowa’s Shelby County. A trooper tried to stop two motorcycles on Saturday night on Interstate 80 as neither had license plates.

The cycles pulled over initially, but then sped off and split up. The trooper chased one motorcycle at speeds that reached 108 miles-an-hour. That motorcyclist eventually crashed near Elk Horn, according to Sergeant Bryan Michelson. “He lost control and laid the motorcycle down and then fled on foot and the trooper was able to catch him within a short distance,” Michelson says. “He was combative and once he was taken to the ground, he continued to be combative. A deputy deployed his tazer and then he gave up.”

That suspect is identified as 24-year-old Tyler John Cross, of Lincoln, Nebraska, who was arrested on multiple felony and traffic charges. Cross was taken into custody and to a hospital for treatment, before being released to law enforcement. During the investigation, Michelson says it was determined the man had several items in his backpack.

“Inside that backpack was a loaded handgun, over half a pound of methamphetamine, two bags of marijuana, prescription pills, paraphernalia, scales and money,” he says. The backpack also contained multiple cell phones. Cross is in the Pottawattamie County Jail on $100,000 bond. The other motorcyclist got away.

(Reporting by Ric Hanson, KJAN, Atlantic)