At 2:05 a.m. Sunday, guards at the James A. Musick jail in Irvine dealt with a man apparently eager to get into the place.

Rather than stop at the front gate of the jail, Matthew Van McDaniel, 25, drove a late-model Mercedes-Benz through it, Orange County Sheriff’s Department Lt. Janet Lonich said.

McDaniel got out of his car, which was left in drive and later hit a tree on the jail campus, Lonich said.

His later confrontation with a Sheriff’s Department sergeant turned into “a little physical altercation,” Sgt. Fritz Von Rettberg said.

McDaniel escaped after giving the sergeant some cuts and bruises, Von Rettberg said. But deputies soon arrested him on the jail campus.

“It’s the first time somebody tried to break into the jail,” Sheriff’s Department spokesman Jim Amormino said.

McDaniel, a dancer, was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving, assault on a police officer, resisting arrest and unspecified weapons charges, Von Rettberg said.

The jail and the gate were not damaged, Lonich said.