The Ballarat father of a boy with a rare blood disorder is urging the shirtless fugitive who stole and burnt their car to hand himself in and end the 'torment'.

Ballarat man Nicholas Lee, 31, has been named as the man responsible for stealing and then burning out a car on Alkera Road, Invermay Park in the early hours of July 27, with detectives from the Ballarat Divisional Response Unit confirming he was the subject of Friday's manhunt.

Swarms of plain-clothes police officers searched the streets of Ballarat for Lee until sundown on Friday, as a police helicopter provided surveillance from the skies.

The stolen car belonged to Luke Dridan, whose 12-year-old son Blake has severe aplastic anaemia, a disorder where the body fails to produce enough blood cells.

READ MORE: HOW THE MANHUNT TOOK PLACE

Mr Dridan told The Courier on Wednesday it had been a "rather chaotic" couple of weeks for the family since the arson, as they tried to find a new normal without their main mode of transport.

Blake has undergone a bone marrow transplant and continues to spend months at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne, for monitoring and more surgeries.

Mr Dridan said the support and offers from the Ballarat community had been "fantastic", and ultimately it's a "shame it's the minority that's an issue in society".

He said of Lee that the "torment he's been causing needs to be dealt with", and the wanted man needs to be "held to account".

"He needs to hand himself over, whether that's just to help him get rehabilitated, or to pay a penance for what he's done," Mr Dridan said.

"Anyone who knows this guy's whereabouts, please hand the details into police. Let's get some justice."

Police were seen searching for a man on the roof of the Allied Pinnacle mill building in Trench Street, behind the Creswick Road Bunnings, about 3pm on August 2.

The shirtless man was seen running from the building, tailed by officers. The man - now identified as Lee - scaled the wire fence, jumped and sprinted towards the railway line before disappearing.

After witnesses said the wanted man had been spotted in the drain system near Macarthur Street Primary School, police were seen lowering themselves into the drain, with a sniffer dog deployed to the area.

READ MORE: SHIRTLESS FUGITIVE STILL AT LARGE

This isn't the first time Lee has escaped from police.

On March 26 in 2012, the man dislocated his thumb and cut up his wrist while slipping out of handcuffs.

When he pleaded guilty to escaping police custody in the Ballarat Magistrates Court in December that year, his defence lawyer told the court he was "not double-jointed or anything, he's just pulled his thumb out of joint, tore some skin off and was able to get free".

- With Hayley Elg, Alex Ford and Jolyon Attwooll

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