Handcuffed suspect sets off pursuit after stealing cop
vehicle in Dearborn
By Craig Garrett / The Detroit News 7-20-1997
A 24-year-old single mother, who worked
two jobs to stay off welfare, died early
Saturday in southwest Detroit.
DaLon Jolliffie of Detroit "didn't stand a
chance," her sister, Tracey Elerson, said,
when the patrol car hit her vehicle as
officers chased a handcuffed prisoner
escaping in an unmarked police car.
The fugitive, Daniel Michael Koroi, 30, of
Dearborn, was being sought Saturday by
police who described him as armed and
dangerous. Koroi stole the police car after he
had been arrested on assault charges and left
alone briefly in the vehicle, police said.
"She never knew what hit her," Elerson said. Heather Stone/Detroit News
DarQuisia Eubanks, 3, right
Jolliffie was on her way home from a
family reunion on Caniff in Hamtramck
before 3 a.m. when the police car hit her
recently purchased 1993 black Mazda during
a chase that began in Dearborn and ended at
Horatio and 31st in Detroit. The police car -- part of a caravan
of six marked patrol cars -- was traveling more than 60 mph in the
residential area when the accident occurred, witnesses told family
members.
Jolliffie died two blocks from her red-and-white brick home on
Junction at about the same time her daughter, DarQuisia Eubanks, 3,
bolted upright in bed, saying, "I want my mommy," said Elerson, who
was baby-sitting for the child at the time of the crash.
"That will stay with me forever," she said.
Jolliffie worked as a sales clerk for Montgomery Ward at Eastland
Mall in Harper Woods and at a Detroit hair salon. The Chadsey High
School graduate was taking college credit courses from Ferris State
University. She wanted to be a nurse, said her mother, Lilly Gunn,
who was about 10 minutes behind her daughter on Horatio. She
reached the scene shortly after the accident.
"My baby was a sweet girl," said Gunn. "They took my baby."
Jolliffie was pronounced dead on arrival at Henry Ford Hospital.
"She was a hard-working girl who wanted to stay off welfare," said
her uncle L.C. Davis.
Speeds reached about more than 60 mph during the chase, which
involved six Dearborn patrol cars. The patrol car that hit Jolliffie
was the second or third car behind Koroi when it slammed into her car,
said Virginia Jones, a Detroit resident who watched police cars
"zooming" through her 31 St Street neighborhood.
She said the marked patrol cars were not using sirens.
"Lights were flashing, but there was no sound," she said. "The only
loud noise I heard was an explosion when they hit that car .. I was
told they heard that sound three blocks away."
Dearborn Police Chief Ron Deziel said he did not know if the
pursuing patrol cars were using sirens, but city policy calls for lights
and sirens during pursuits. The chase was videotaped from inside a
patrol car; the tape has "not been fully reviewed," Deziel said, and
wasn't released Saturday.
The force of the collision slammed Jollifies car 150 feet into the
porch of a house on 31st, pinning her inside the crushed vehicle. Car
parts littered the street from the intersection to the porch.
A Dearborn police officer involved in the chase injured himself
when he broke the car window in an attempt to rescue her.
Police found the unmarked patrol car, still running, about four
blocks away at Horatio and 35th.
Detroit police and Michigan State Police were investigating the
accident Saturday, said Detroit Police Chief Isaiah McKimion.
"We are trying to find out what exactly happened," McKinnon said.
Special units from several departments also were chasing down tips
from callers on Koroi's whereabouts.
The chase began after police arrested Koroi, who Deziel said has a
history of drug convictions and assaultive behavior, at Michigan and
Interstate 94 on an outstanding warrant for assaulting a Melvindale
police officer. Police were tipped to Koroi's whereabouts by his ex-
wife Deziel said.
At about 2:20 a.m., Dearborn police left Koroi alone in the
unmarked police car -- its engine still running. After slipping his legs
through the handcuffs from behind his back, he climbed into the front
seat and took off down Michigan into Detroit.
"The officers took due care and caution not to put an innocent
person in jeopardy," Deziel said. "It's certainly a horrible tragedy."
Deziel said Dearborn officers didn't call off the chase in Detroit
because the unmarked car contained several weapons and police radio
equipment.
Koroi, who had cleared the intersection before the crash, drove on
for a few blocks then grabbed the shotgun from the car and fled.
Police used dogs to track him and believed he used a pay phone in the
area. He may have been picked up by a friend, police said.
No officers have been disciplined, but an investigation is under
way. The officer involved in the accident -- "an outstanding young
officer" with 10 years on the force, Deziel said -- was put on paid
leave until a review is complete. He did not identify the officer.
The fatal accident was the second in three years involving
Dearborn officers in a high-speed chase into Detroit.
In 1994, a fleeing suspect crashed head-on into a car driven by Ed
Hedgespeth, 52, in Detroit, killing him instantly.
Dearborn police insisted they broke off the chase before the crash,
but the city settled with Hedgespeth's family for $1 million.
The 1994 chase, which also began at 2:20 a.m., generated bitter
feelings between the Dearborn and Detroit police departments. A
Detroit police commander accused his Dearborn counterparts of lying
when they said the chase, with speeds of up to 85 mph, ended before
the crash.
Sequence of events
1. A unmarked Dearborn police car pulls over Daniel Michael
Koroi on Michigan Avenue at Interstate 94. Officers cuff Koroi and
place him in their vehicle. As they confer outside the car, a
handcuffed Koroi hops into the driver's seat and heads off east on
Michigan Avenue, turning north on 31 St Street.
2. Don Jolliffie is traveling west on Horatio on the way home
from a family reunion. As she crosses 31 St, a marked Dearborn police
car chasing Koroi broadsides Jolliffie and pushes her Mazda 150 feet
into a house. She was killed instantly.
3. The unmarked police car is found running on 35th and Horatio.
Koroi flees with a shotgun in the car, he's still at large.
Anyone with information about Daniel Michael Koroi is asked to
telephone (313) 943-TIPS.
A funeral for Don Jolliffie win be at 11 a.m. Friday at Pleasant
Hill Missionary Baptist Church, 5207 Lovett, Detroit.
Detroit News staff writer Jodi Cohen contributed to this report.
Copyright 1997, The Detroit News
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