‘Horrific: Video Shows Michigan Cop Speeding at 115 MPH In the Dark with No Emergency Lights Before Killing Two Black Men; Family Outraged As Lawyers Try to Shift Blame to Victims
A Michigan police officer was driving 115 mph without emergency lights or sirens seconds before crashing into a car and killing two Black men inside, resulting in vehicular manslaughter charges against the cop.
But the cop’s attorneys are trying to lay the blame on the Black man driving the car, Cedric Hayden Jr., after a toxicology report revealed he had a blood alcohol concentration of .198, which is more than twice the legal limit of .08. Hayden, 34, was killed instantly along with his lifelong friend, Dejuan Pettis, 33.
However, Macomb County prosecutors are fighting to keep the toxicology report from being introduced in the cop’s trial, arguing that it would be prejudicial, meaning it could influence the jurors to side with the cop before even hearing details about his alleged crime.
The judge overseeing the case, District Court Judge John Chmura, has not ruled yet on whether he would allow the toxicology report to to be introduced as evidence but he is expected to announce his decision any day now, according to The Detroit News.
“The speed the defendant was driving caused the crash,” Assistant Macomb County Prosecutor Cory Newman testified in a hearing in late April, according to The Detroit News.
“Introducing Mr. Hayden’s toxicology results is just meant to confuse the issue and paint a negative picture of Mr. Hayden.”
But defense attorneys representing former Warren police officer James Burke, the cop who was driving the patrol car that night, argued that it was not prejudicial.
“If that evidence was to be excused, I think that would be more prejudicial to Officer Burke than to Mr. Hayden, who was killed in the accident,” defense lawyer Marc Curtis said during the hearing.
Videos Released
The incident took place at about 4:45 a.m. on Sept. 30, 2024, as Burke was driving his patrol car with his partner, Michael Rodolfo, pursuing a suspect in a stolen car along a street where the speed limit was 40 mph.
But videos of the crash were not released until Monday, including dashcam footage from Burke’s patrol car as well as footage from two security cameras, including a gas station and a landscaping business.
The city of Warren had filed a motion to not make the videos public as well as other evidence in the case but the judge eventually allowed release of the videos but not all of the evidence, said attorney James Harrington, who is representing the families of both men in a civil lawsuit.
“We’ve been able to discover a mountain of evidence that supports our claims,” Harrington to The Detroit News.
“We’d love to be able to give it to you, but we’re only allowed to give you a portion of it.”
The dashcam video, that Harrington describes as “horrific”, shows Burke traveling at 117 mph seconds before the crash and at 109 mph in the milliseconds before the crash. The video contains no audio but shows Hayden attempting to make a left turn right before the cop crashes into his car.
The video from the landscaping business provides a clear view of the crash with sound and the video from the gas station captures the cop speeding, then seconds later, the sound of a loud impact can be heard.
Responding officers testified that Burke appeared to be “in a panic” and “traumatized” and “shook” as he tried to attend to the victims in the car he had just struck, according to testimony from Warren police officers Rami Anees and Andrew Piasecki.
Family members of the two men reacted with shock after watching the videos for the first time Monday.
“I just want justice for these boys,” Hayden’s father, Cedric Hayden Sr. told local media after watching the videos.
Pettis’ mother, Shakira, told local media that his two sons, ages 8 and 10, have been “crying themselves to sleep every night.”
“His boys are hurting,” she said.
The lawsuit lists both cops as defendants and accuses them of gross negligence, willful and wanton misconduct and negligent operation of a government-owned vehicle as accuses the city of ownership liability.
Watch the video below.