A Warren, Michigan, man broke into a marijuana business to fill his vehicle with cannabis and make a quick escape. But the robber didn’t get very far before police were hot on his tail. The resultant high-speed chase took the suspect and his pursuers miles into the west end of Detroit before he crashed his pickup truck into a bystander’s home. That’s certainly not how you want to wake up. 

A marijuana business robbery took police on a 15-mile chase from Warren to West Detroit until the suspect crashed into a home

Police in Warren, Michigan, responded to reports of a robbery at a marijuana business. The criminal managed to escape from the business with a “large amount of marijuana.” However, police used a description of the suspect’s Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck to find the vehicle. After a failed attempt to pull the suspect vehicle over, the chase was on.

This was no short game of cat-and-mouse, mind you. The robber led the pursuing police officers around 15 miles from Warren to a neighborhood near Ewald Circle on the west side of the Motor City. Unfortunately, the reason the chase came to an end was nothing short of wild. The wayward marijuana thief slammed his Chevrolet Silverado into a home, stopping the truck in its tracks.

“I just hear this big boom, and I’m thinking it’s like an explosion; it’s so loud,” said neighborhood resident Stephanie McKnight. “They’re from Warren, Michigan. Why are you chasing this person all the way on Schoolcraft and Davison? To me, it’s just too much,” McKnight said of the chase. “Someone could’ve got killed.” 

And she’s not wrong. Pursuit data reports that over 11,500 people have died in police chases over 34 years, per USA Today. Alarmingly, more than 5,000 of those fatalities were innocent bystanders. It’s precisely why some departments operate with a “no-chase” policy that limits or even prohibits potentially dangerous pursuits.

According to WXYZ Detroit, the police department stands by the decision to chase the marijuana bandit. “We evaluate these pursuits both in real time and after the fact to make the best decisions we can,” a Warren Police Department lieutenant said. “There are certain pursuits — and I certainly believe this is one of them — where I think even the community would say we shouldn’t let this guy go.”