Police Commissioner Says High-Speed Chase That Killed Driver Was ‘The Right Call’

Andy Kalmowitz

January 4, 2024 at 1:15 PM·2 min read

On December 26, a 24-year-old man died in a brutal car crash with a box truck following a high-speed police chase after he was pulled over in Warren, Michigan. Police maintain that they were doing their job despite the fact no one should be condemned to death for a traffic violation.

In fact, police are putting 100 percent of the blame on the driver for his choice to drive away from a police stop. The family of Maurice Kelley tells 7 Action News Detroit that he was pulled over on his lunch break for expired license plate tabs. Kelley reportedly told officers he didn’t have his license on him (it was actually suspended). They asked him to get out of his 2015 Chevy Cruz, but that’s when he put the car in drive and took off.

Here’s what else police had to say about the chase and crash (take this with a huge grain of salt because cops, you know, lie a lot), according to The Detroit News:

Police supervisors authorized and monitored the officers’ chase in real time, a judgement call Dwyer said he supported after reviewing the case.
[...]
Police did not know the driver’s identity until after the crash, Dwyer said.
”In many, many cases, maybe in the majority of cases we run into, when we have a fleeing and eluding particular case, that always leads up to someone that was either wanted on a felony, convicted of a felony, or going to commit a felony,” Dwyer said.
Police later learned the man had a misdemeanor warrant for a traffic violation, Dwyer said.
The man also had a 2018 Oakland County felony conviction and a 2019 Wayne County felony conviction for possessing a firearm as a convicted felon, Dwyer said.
Police found a loaded Glock semi-automatic handgun on the car’s floorboard after the crash, Dwyer said. That gun was previously reported stolen, he said.
“We all feel bad that someone died, but the officers were doing their job,” Dwyer said. “If he would have stopped, he would be with us today.”

For years now, police departments have been cutting down on police pursuits because of the risk they pose to the public, according to 7 Action News. In 2022, Michigan State Police put a policy in place that only allows officers to chase a suspect if they’re wanted for a felony, driving the wrong direction down an interstate or posing an “imminent threat to public safety” for reasons other than the chase itself.

This was the 293rd police chase in Warren in 2023. Perhaps it is time for the Warren Police Department to take a good hard look at their practices before even more people die.