A license plate reader alert just before 9 p.m. on October 10 set off a chase that stretched from Hendersonville into Gallatin, ending with a 27-year-old Nashville man facing a kidnapping charge, two of his three passengers detained — while the third was never found. Antonio D. Derrick now sits in the Sumner County Jail on a $185,000 bond, with a court date set for next week.
Stolen SUV Triggers Pursuit Across County Lines
According to Main Street Media of Tennessee, the Hendersonville Police Department received the plate-reader alert on a gray Toyota RAV4 that had been reported stolen out of Davidson County as it crossed into city limits. Derrick allegedly fled when an officer asked for his license during the resulting traffic stop, per court records cited in the report. An HPD officer reportedly pursued the SUV eastbound on Highway 386 at speeds exceeding 110 miles per hour.
The chase crossed jurisdictions without much certainty from the agencies trying to track it. Sumner County deputies reportedly said they never saw the vehicle pass exit 12 or exit 14 on Highway 386, and Gallatin police officers reportedly said they never spotted it near the intersection of Highway 386 and Long Hollow Pike. Sheriff's deputies eventually located the RAV4 on Offitt Drive in Gallatin, where they detained three of its four occupants.
Fourth Occupant Never Located Despite K9, Drone Search
The fourth person inside the vehicle was gone by the time deputies arrived, and a search using K9 units and drones failed to turn up any trace of them, the report notes. Derrick allegedly told police he bought the vehicle from an unnamed acquaintance and did not know it had been reported stolen.
Derrick allegedly identified two of the other occupants in the vehicle — Jonathan Lewis, described as his “homeboy,” and Malachi Derrick, described as his younger brother. But the accounts from those two men reportedly contradicted that version of events in different ways. Malachi Derrick reportedly told police he was not Antonio Derrick's brother at all, and said he had instead been waiting on a park bench in the Gallatin neighborhood where the vehicle was found.
Passenger Says He Wanted No Part Of It
Jonathan Lewis offered his own account of how he ended up in the SUV. He reportedly told police he met Antonio Derrick at a gas station in Hermitage and was offered a ride to Gallatin to pick up his mother. As the pursuit unfolded, Lewis reportedly said he urged Derrick to pull over, and he allegedly said afterward that he had no idea what was happening and wanted no part in it.
Derrick was booked into the Sumner County Jail and now faces a lengthy list of charges: kidnapping, theft of property between $10,000 and $60,000, evading arrest by vehicle, reckless endangerment with a vehicle, reckless driving, speeding and driving on a suspended license, according to the same report. His bond was set at $185,000, and he is scheduled to appear in General Sessions Court on October 27.
Part of a Broader Pattern of Chases in Middle Tennessee
Other reports have documented evading-arrest incidents in Middle Tennessee. A 2025 report from WKRN found the Williamson County Sheriff's Office logged 95 chases in 2023, 71 in 2024 and 48 through late September of 2025. Farther west, the Tennessee Lookout identified 75 separate vehicle pursuits tied to evading-arrest charges connected to a Memphis safe task force. Under Tennessee law, intentionally fleeing or attempting to elude an officer after receiving a signal to stop is itself a criminal offense, according to the statutory text published via Justia.
Stolen vehicles and passengers caught in the middle have surfaced in other recent Tennessee chases as well. Fox 13 Memphis reported in March on an armed driver who allegedly led state troopers on a high-speed chase in a stolen car while a woman inside said he would not let her out. And WREG reported in August that an 18-year-old was charged with leading Tennessee Highway Patrol troopers on a chase in a different stolen vehicle.
For now, the whereabouts of the fourth person who was in the RAV4 with Derrick, Lewis and Malachi Derrick remain unknown, and no additional details on that search have been released. Derrick's next scheduled court date, October 27, will be the first public test of the case against him.
