Wanted Atchison man arrested, police say fentanyl found during patrol stop

Fentanyl stayed a public-safety threat in Atchison late Thursday night, when a patrol officer spotted a wanted 41-year-old man in the 900 block of North 9th Street and moved in to make an arrest before midnight. Police identified the man as Jason Nowak of Atchison and said fentanyl and drug paraphernalia were found after he was taken into custody.

Atchison Police Chief Mike Wilson said the officer saw Nowak just before midnight on May 22, 2026. The Atchison County Sheriff’s Office jail roster shows Nowak was booked by the Atchison Police Department at 1:35 a.m. on May 23, 2026. The roster lists a City of Atchison bench warrant, number 18-4485, for failure to appear, along with new arrest charges of possession of an opiate, opium, narcotic or certain stimulant and use or possess with intent to use drug paraphernalia into the human body.

Bond was listed at $10,200 on one roster entry, while another display showed $2,700, suggesting the amount was updated after booking. The arrest did not end with a simple possession case. It also put a missed-court warrant back into the hands of police, showing how quickly an open case can return to the public-safety system when officers recognize someone who is wanted.

The stop happened in a residential stretch of north Atchison, where routine patrols can turn into enforcement actions with immediate neighborhood impact. Atchison County Sheriff’s Office population information puts the county at over 16,000 residents, and the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the county’s 2024 population at 16,249. In a community that size, a fentanyl arrest tied to a warrant can draw attention well beyond one block.

The case also lands in the middle of a larger drug picture in Kansas. The Kansas Department of Health and Environment says overdose deaths in the state increased 43% from 2020 to 2023, and a KDHE report says at least 80% of opioid-involved overdose deaths involved fentanyl. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and KFF data show Kansas recorded 556 drug overdose deaths in 2024, including 285 involving synthetic opioids such as fentanyl.

That broader toll helps explain why this arrest matters in Atchison County. Even a single late-night stop fits into a statewide pattern in which fentanyl continues to surface in small communities, not just larger metro areas, and local patrols remain one of the first lines of defense.