He then rammed two police cars and hit a female officer, leaving her face covered in blood.
One of the police involved told the County Court in Melbourne he feared he could have been killed in the ordeal.
Pennington, 35, was jailed for more than two years on Monday after pleading guilty to eight charges following a dangerous police chase in Victoria's east.
On January 17, 2022, police found him slumped over in the front seat of a red Toyota sedan, which had been stolen four days earlier during a burglary in Morwell, the court was told.
Pennington awoke from his slumber and started the engine, as two officers approached the car from behind and tried to deflate its tyres.
He reversed and sped off backyards, nearly hitting both officers and ramming into the side of their police van.
Pennington's tyres began to deflate as he sped away, with the car swerving across the road.
He drove through residential streets in Traralgon trying to flee from police, who had lights and sirens activated for the chase.
Two of the stolen sedan's tyres burst, and Pennington was driving on the car's rims when an officer nudged the vehicle onto a nature strip to get it off the road.
But Pennington did not stop. He tried to accelerate away and rammed into the side of a second police car before getting out and trying to escape.
He ran into a front yard, where attempted to scale a fence but was confronted by three officers.
As they tried to arrest him he swung and flailed his arms, striking a female sergeant in the face. She was left with a one centimetre cut to her nose, swelling and bruising.
Pennington was brought to the road where he was eventually overpowered by police and arrested.
He told police in an interview he had taken a large amount of GHB and had "swapped drugs" for the stolen car. He was a disqualified driver at the time.
One of the officers who Pennington nearly ran over said in a statement the ordeal "brought home to him the possibility of being killed" while at work, and made him question his job as a police officer.
Pennington admitted to charges including assaulting an emergency worker on duty, recklessly exposing an emergency worker to risk by driving, damaging a police vehicle and dangerous driving while pursued by police.
Judge Peter Lauritsen sentenced Pennington to 31 months in prison and disqualified him from driving for four years.
"Escaping from police in a motor vehicle is inherently risky. Your actions were deliberate," the judge said.
Pennington has already served one year and two months of his sentence and will be eligible for parole after 20 months.
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