ATTLEBORO - A man with a history of drunken driving who nearly struck a police cruiser on Pleasant Street in December 2007 has been sentenced to 7 1/2 years in prison.

Steven M. Lahey, 46, of 250 Mansfield Ave. in Norton, was convicted Tuesday by a 12-member New Bedford Superior Court jury of a fifth-offense drunken driving charge and driving with a suspended license because of a drunken driving conviction.

Judge E. Susan Garsh gave Lahey a 4- to 5-year prison term for the drunken driving charge, followed by a 2 1/2-year jail term for the suspended license charge, according to Gregg Miliote, a spokesman for Bristol County District Attorney Sam Sutter.

Lahey was caught with an open beer bottle between his legs when he was stopped on Pleasant Street in Attleboro after almost colliding head-on with a cruiser driven by Norton Patrolman Jeffrey Zaccardi at a bend west of Richardson Avenue, according to court records.

Zaccardi was returning to Norton from Sturdy Memorial Hospital at the time, and turning his cruiser around to stop Lahey's car. He radioed a Norton dispatcher to contact Attleboro police, and stopped Lahey's car on Pleasant Street near Lindsey Street moments before Attleboro Patrolman Richard Pierce Jr. arrived, according to court records.

After completing his incarceration, Lahey will be placed on five years' probation, Miliote said.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant District Attorney Gregory Tinsworth.