The man was arrested after punching an Oregon police officer

The 42-year-old has a lengthy criminal history, court records show, and law enforcement had previously warned about his propensity for violence.

The man accused of striking and killing a Santaquin police officer with a tractor-trailer early Sunday has a long criminal history, including an assault conviction in 2009 after he nearly killed an Oregon officer with a vehicle .

The man, a 42-year-old California native, was charged with multiple counts According to public court records, the story dates back to at least 2001. In addition to previous allegations of attacks on law enforcement, he has also been accused of stealing vehicles and fleeing authorities – similar to the fatal Sunday crash, manhunt and subsequent police pursuit in Utah that ended with his arrest.

As of Monday afternoon, the man had not been formally charged in connection with the Sunday morning crash on Interstate 15 near Santaquin that left Santaquin police Sgt. Court records show Bill Hooser is dead. The Salt Lake Tribune generally does not name defendants unless they have been accused of a crime.

In 2001, the same man was convicted of resisting a police officer in California. In that case, according to court documents, a truck stop cashier called police and reported that the man had shoplifted. When officers arrived, they found themselves fighting with the man.

A deputy later testified in court that the man attempted to drive away while the deputy worked to remove him from the vehicle. The deputy recalled being trapped in the car and “dragged” while the man’s vehicle, a Chevrolet Blazer, jumped forward, a court filing said.

“If the young man happened to put the car in gear, (a truck stop employee) would be dead because the Blazer was pointed directly at the front door where (the employee) was standing,” a witness told investigators, according to court documents.

In 2009, the man pleaded guilty to assault and possession of body armor after prosecutors said he tried to run over an officer in Klamath County, Oregon, court records show. The attempted murder charge was dismissed and he was sentenced to three years and four months in prison.

A year after his conviction, he was charged with threatening a correctional officer in California, the Great Bend Tribune in Kansas reported in 2012, when the man was reportedly on the run in the state.

The newspaper article at the time said the man was “willing to engage in high-speed chases and cause accidents to avoid capture, as well as being willing to break into homes,” citing the Barton County Sheriff’s Office. “He threatened to take lethal action to avoid being incarcerated again.”

Federal court records show a U.S. Marshals task force arrested the man in Texas in 2012. He was wanted for a probation violation in Oregon and authorities discovered he was illegally in possession of guns and ammunition.

During his detention, the man submitted several handwritten complaints questioning his detention and he claimed his civil rights had been violated, court records show.

The fatal crash in Utah early Sunday occurred after a person reported someone standing in the back of a tractor-trailer traveling north on Interstate 15, police said.

When Hooser and a Utah Highway Patrol trooper attempted to stop the tractor-trailer near Santaquin around 6:30 a.m., the driver continued driving and continued north a short distance before turning around and heading the wrong way back toward Hooser and was driving toward the police officer, police said.

The tractor-trailer hit both Hooser’s vehicle and the officer’s vehicle. The soldier was not injured, but Hooser died at the scene. It is unclear whether anyone was ever in the bed of the semi-trailer, as originally reported.

After the accident, the driver fled the scene, stole several vehicles and ended up in Vernal, about 175 miles east of the stop.

There he led the police on a chase at “extremely high speed” and ultimately had an accident, the authorities announced on Monday. He was hospitalized and is currently not listed on any local prison lists. As of Monday afternoon, no probable cause information or other court records — including charging documents — were available online.

Law enforcement in Utah led a procession Monday from the state medical examiner’s office in Taylorsville south to Santaquin and took the fallen officer’s body to a local morgue. Police and others lined the street to show their support.

The Santaquin Police Department is relatively small, with just 15 officers, according to Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, who expressed condolences to the fallen officer’s family on Sunday.

“Our entire department is hurting, and the officer’s family is hurting by the senseless act of one individual,” Lt. Mike Wall of the Santaquin Police Department at an emotional news conference Sunday. A colleague put his arm around Wall as he spoke.

“We have family members who will miss their father at their upcoming wedding, but I can assure you that we will be there as a police force and we are family,” Wall said.