LIVE | Prosecutor to announce charging decision in death of Riley Doggett

e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e appreciate everybody coming out today apologize for the late start I just met with a family um and talked to them about the case and they saw the video for the first time um I think they're obviously troubled by what occurred and had some questions so we started 11:30 and it took a little bit longer than I anticipated um but I guess to cut right to it in terms of what we're going to do with this case I have filed charges against the driver uh the juvenile driver of the white Land Rover I'll to show you the video here you get a copy of that uh one count of fleeing and alluding in the first degree essentially that is fleeing and alluding causing death okay we charged him we've also charged him with CCE continuing criminal Enterprises uh for what occurred on this day um both those are felony charges uh what I am going to do I'm going to ask for an adult waiver as well uh they're juvenile not going to announce it since it is a juvenile this is not a situation where I can do an automatic waiver uh very often in uh you know homicides rape something like that I can automatically wave a juvenile to the adult court that is not the case here I can ask the court for permission it's called a traditional waiver so I'll be asking for a traditional waiver on this juvenile for the fleing and leing and the CCE charges um so I'll get into it a little bit more I figure this is you know kind of explain my decision maybe after I show you the video this is the incar video of what happened on that day to give you a little bit of background this was probably about just before 7:00 as you can see I think it's 1856 so it's just before 7:00 uh in the evening what preceded this though was a Chase in Holland uh the Holland Police had actually chased the same uh Land Rover dep Range Rover however you want to it changes around in terms of who's describing it U but they had led the led him on the chase is from Holland all the way to the basically the county line in Grand Rapids and what had occurred was the deputy had uh caught the flock camera had it coming across down 44 street so if you're coming across a state line right at Rivertown Parkway it's very easy to get off there you're cutting across heading towards 131 he had information that the vehicle was coming he knew about the chase in Holland knew the Holland Police had basically Chase it uh all the way to the county line and so he was picking this up at this point in time this is you'll pick up the video as he's making contact with this white uh Range Rover as it it comes up sh going are [Music] TR [Music] turn [Music] are [Music] second [Music] [Music] what r I'll stop it there in terms of you know that's nothing in terms of this body cam you'll see anything the video You're see anything more but quite clearly they he hit him he sideswiped him kind of went to the side uh from the evidence of you I'll show you my opinion in a little bit from the evidence what our peers do is he caught him with the tire from his statement he was trying to cut him off trying to cut him off from going into the neighbor neighborhoods in the back there um tried to pull in front of him looks like the tire essentially cut caught his uh left uh calf pulling off his shoe and kind of a slingshot down you saw it was a it was a violent fall to the ground uh so that's what occurred there and based on everything I think if you look at it it's not showing up there now but he was doing about 22 miles an hour according to the incar video uh we have no reason to disbelieve that these Cruisers are equipped with uh the black box if you will to record it but the event is not recorded you know it just didn't record enough to be a exact from the back box so he's doing 22 miles an hour he also says and from the video I also can show you he believes there may be a gun involved look at there maybe you can see right there you get a little bigger a black object it turned out to be a cell phone in his hand uh but this group they've been quite frankly I think the police have said they've been trying to watch this group the Holland Police had pursued him there had been uh allegations of this group being involved in stolen cars shots have been fired in other places so he thought this was an armed individual running into a neighborhood and so he made the decision to try and cut him off he thought he had uh didn't think he had enough time to actually stop the car get out the kids had a quite a bit of head starts so he tried to pull in front of them as you can see made contact ATT at some point in time catching with the the side of his car um I talked to the medical examiner the medical examiner I did talk to him after people were asking I talk to him Friday afternoon in terms of Friday afternoon and trying to explain he said there's no evidence that he was actually run over um there's nothing you know in terms of crush like his leg was crushed or anything like that it was he was caught in the the force he had a broken hip the force slammed his head to the ground causing causing head injuries that caused his demise So based on all this based on the facts and circumstances I did not find a basis to to charge the officer essentially I looked at you you look at first second murder secondary murder there's an intent to kill an intent to Great bodily harm did not find that here quite clear he's going past them he's trying to cut them off from getting into a neighborhood uh can you say that the the natural tendency the likely Act is to cause death or great bodily harm when you're trying to cut in front of somebody uh and stop them from going there clearly if he wanted to run him over he could have just gunned it right at him and there's no evidence of that once again talking about the medal examin there's no he didn't get thrown he's at the side of the vehicle so he didn't just run them over so the likely uh intent we have for a secondary murder is not there so I looked at gross negligence and gross negligence is very similar I don't use this as much but the defendant is aware of the risk but to the ordinary mind it must be apparent that the likely result is proove death disastrous to another and once again give him the speed 22 miles hour he's trying to apprehend what he believes are dangerous individuals they this is not you don't take this as just you know what happens here there's a kid running they have run from the police in Holland just before for this they had the extensive uh uh Chase here there is a possibility of of uh guns being involved given the totality of the circumstances you know at that speed I can't say to the ordinary mind that death or great body harm is going to result obviously the execution did not happen in terms of how he executed his trying to pull in front of him didn't uh occur properly um but the the fact he's trying to do that is not enough to prove gross negligence for some sort of involuntary manslaughter charge we did look at the reckless driving reckless driving is kind of the next level down if you look at reckless driving uh it's a lower standard but once again you look at the language there conduct that results in a plain and strong likelihood that death or great bodily harm would result I can't say there's a plain and strong likelihood at that speed given the circumstances and everything like that so we're left once again the only thing we have was a moving violation causing death a moving violation causing death is kind of some sort of a civil infraction a ticket if you will but when you look at the Civil infraction there is a specific statute MCL 257 603 kind of uh grants leeway to officers responding an emergency situation and when you're responding in an emergency situation they can do things that we can't do or other people can't do they can run stop lights they can exceed speeds they can do stuff like that so it's hard to point at a civil infraction that he would have committed you know driving over the curb now none of us can do that but in a Pursuit there are certain things officers can do when they're trying to apprehend what they believe in the at the time is a dangerous individual so looking at all that I did not believe there's a sufficient basis to file any criminal charges against the deputy but that does leave the the juvenile who led the police on this Chase uh and that's why I said we're charging him with a fleeing and the Looting first uh fleeing and the Looting causing death for you know leading the police on this Chase and resulting in the death of Riley this is a tragic situation uh I met with a family they're they are not happy with the this decision quite clearly um so we had a long discussion and I'm sure they think the Jeopardy should be charged but based on my analysis to the law uh based on everything I looked at I just find no basis to F charge the deputy in the circumstance so that's my statement uh I guess I'll open up for any questions right now where did you where did you meet the family at the State Police post the state police post six District right over there in Walker and can you talk about that conversation a little more you said that they were not happy what was their initial reaction when you it's horror I mean it's horror to watch I can't imagine what it's like for the mom to and the brother and sister to watch their brother sister son to get hit like that and go down they clearly thought the deputy should be charged um I I try to explain to him my Reon I provided them a copy of the opinion uh they disagree I wasn't expecting them to you know to agree I understand that I understand there's going to be people that disagree with this decision not just the family members um but I I really you know took a look at this took a look at with my staff much like I do a lot of these cases and and try to analyze this point by point and I'll have a copy each there's one opinion for each network if you will and you can get a little bit more in depth um but I try to do this the best I can I just did not find a basis to charge the deputy now Ben Johnson the attorney for the family say the case of the using the car is is a deadly weapon no different than a gun see I I didn't see that I mean you know he he could have gunned it and went right at him I mean that's a thing quite clearly from the from the video he could have you know there was nothing stopping him and he did not do that he clearly hits him from the side so he's trying to cut him off he didn't do it appropriately and and did and hit him and maybe cut it too close and obviously they are tragic results but this was not a matter where you know using the gun analogy where he shooting at him he didn't shoot at him he didn't gun right for him he was trying clearly going by him and trying to go around him and he got caught and that happen it happens it's it's a horrible horrible thing to occur but you know it's not and that's why it didn't get even get into fling felon because I thought that you know using deadly force against a fling felon I don't think we get that analysis here because he was not trying to use deadly force against a fling felon he was trying to cut him off and caught him and what he was trying to do so what do you say to people who look at this video and say why didn't he just get out the car and chase him I mean yeah you can say that he didn't intend to do it but a car versus a person I mean that's not always an well it's it's always easy for us you know to review a Monday Morning Quarterback and say okay he could have done this yeah he could have done that you know he the kids have a head start on him they got a head start him and he says he thinks there's a weapon there's clearly houses right there do then if he stops and gets them out and tries to run they've got quite a bit ahead start then they're in with civilians I mean it's it's Split Second decision at that point in time so that's hard to say well he could have yeah he could have done that he could have you know they said why don't they let the dog out he's it's a canine unit he could have let the dog out but if you continue on it takes it's a process to get them out get the leash on let you know they don't necessarily have that time given the circumstances and I'm not saying given the circumstances these are different circumstances we may have charges here it all depends on what's going on in the totality and this is not just done in a vacuum and so that that played a large role into this you talk was this a close call for you was this a tough call yeah there was you know it was these are all difficult and I think this was something that took a look at obviously it's you know 42 days it's been a while since this happened so it wasn't something that was just a jump to a conclusion and quite frankly you know there's Why didn't it come out sooner I met with Dr Cole on Friday I me I was meeting Friday afternoon I was meeting with Dr Co to discuss some of this evidence and talk about you know what he had seen the video so I'm like hey let's take a look at this here's what I'm thinking the evidence in my mind is this and he he kind of supported that saying yeah that makes sense kind of what you're looking at um there wasn't the if you get hit by a car you get thrown it wasn't that it dropped right there because it looked like there there's kind of a catch in that tire if you will that's I guess I'll throw you there's another photo which I can share basing that decision on was handcuffed afterwards and this is just a if you have right there you can kind of see there's a black mark if if you can see going down the calf and that one shoe is off the other shoe is not off so that's where I'm basing it looks like he got got caught up in the tire and ran up his leg and that provided the the impetus to fall directly to the ground and vient fashion now this Sheriff Department earlier put on a release saying basically this group brought this on himself own with his actions you saw that press release I did not see that press I guess I did not see that press release so no I did not see that so you know I'm not going to say brought it on the know people make decisions you know it's you know it's there is decision made by everybody but to say I am hesitant to say he brought it on himself you know I wouldn't go out there and say that can you go back to um the decision in terms of waving for the juvenile just for for those listening are you saying you want to wave the option for them to be charged as I believe I believe they should be charged as an adult okay but I can't do that on my own I have to petition the court in essence saying hey this juvenile because of everything that's going on here record prior history this incident I believe there's a sufficient basis to move them into the adult Court that's ultimately a Judicial determination the Judiciary can say yeah I think I agree with you or nope we're going to keep it as a juvenile uh that's all I can do under these circumstances I don't have the complete power at as if it were you know a juvenile charged with murder I can do that in circum circumstances say nope it's my opinion move them right to the adult Court I can't do that here do you into that a little bit more though because I think if some people may watch this and hear juvenile you know an adult knows what's right and wrong juvenile sometimes they don't talk about why that's your decision but that's you know in terms of that goes into the history and it's hard to talk about the specific history of the juvenile but this is just something based on the totality of this juvenile's history whether it be this instance his past history whatever it is that's what the whole basis is it's not just because well I think it is this incident it's taking a look at the whole circumstan and everything that that juvenile has been through in their time and that's that's about as clear as I can go I can't go into you know their history completely Ry was the passenger right correct saw that correct correct and if you listen to if you listen to the the body C or the incar video you hear the one of the Wilding uh Cruisers as they coming down at one point in time say driver appears to be black male with with uh silver hood or something along those lines so you can clearly hear that well how well the deputy knew that at the time when you know people are bailing out and how well he heard that at the time that's hard to tell did the Jey even know he had he him clearly no did he know right away that he did him he stopped I I from I can't tell that you know from there's body Cam and we'll share that with you he comes out saying show me your hands show me your hands but I'm not going I don't want to get that with you in terms of live stream because there's some Ric things on that but he does come out saying show me your hands and then comes around so I don't know if he actually realized he hit him until he came around the corner of the of the cruiser and did the deputy make a statement to the state police I know yes so he was interviewed by the state police he made a statement gave a written statement y written stat yep but he was not interviewed he a a rent statement that's fairly common in these types of situations and is he still you have to ask the sheriff that I believe so but I don't know what the status is of him right now the officer it's in my it's in my opinion so in terms of the Deputy will it still be considered accidental then that's that's in terms of that's what the me in terms of how Sheriff's Department characterize it I you know that's something you know I don't even say it's an accident that's not NE I say there's no criminal charges that's about as far as I go accidental and negligence and stuff like that that's probably more in the Civil Arena which I don't I don't deal with so that's going to be left up to somebody else you expect this to be the attorney for the family to ask the AG to review this if you heard that I don't know I have not heard that at all no you also talked about the potential of there being a weapon in the hand just for clarification was there anything no it was a phone it was clearly it was a phone that was found the side but if you saw from that photo it looked like there was something there clearly okay and I'll share I got check got like seven so like one per may be short how many more grab one more oh actually that's why I got one here that's why I have a short one okay thank you you [Music]