By ANDREA POTEET and JAMES MITCHELL
Sunday Times Newspapers
TRENTON – Wyandotte police arrested a 31-year-old Romulus man here Tuesday after a high-speed case that began in Taylor and ended after the man’s Mercury Grand Marquis hit a resident’s air conditioning unit.
Demetrius Roquemore was arraigned Thursday in Wyandotte’s 27th District Court on charges of fleeing police and obstructing justice. Charges of felonious assault in Taylor’s 23rd District Court were pending as of press time Friday.
Taylor police first saw Roquemore swerving on Van Born Road about 1:20 a.m. Tuesday before hitting a curb near Oldham. A traffic stop revealed that Roquemore did not have a valid license, at which point he allegedly grabbed Officer Christopher Cates by the shirt, put his vehicle in drive and hit the gas.
Cates struck Roque-more in the head with a fist, and freed himself from being dragged down the street.
Roquemore headed south on Oldham, followed by Cates and his partner through a series of streets and soon assisted by police from Dearborn Heights and Allen Park. According to police reports Roquemore reached speeds as high as 85 mph on wet roads during the chase.
About 1:30 a.m. Wyandotte officers received a radio alert that Taylor police were pursuing the car on Southfield into Allen Park at high rates of speed.
Minutes later, according to the report, the Wyandotte officer saw a car matching the description on Biddle with a police car in pursuit and tailed it down Biddle to Pennsylvania, driving at speeds of up to 80 mph, running red lights and nearly striking several vehicles.
He pursued the car into Riverview and Trenton, where the vehicle exceeded 80 mph in a 25 mph zone. At some point, the other police vehicle abandoned the chase and Riverview and Trenton units joined in.
The car traveled from West Jefferson to Fifth to Elm, ran across a large curb into a field and crashed into an air conditioning unit of a house in the 400 block of Elm. After sustaining four flat tires from the curb, the car came to a rest in a nearby alley.
Roquemore declined to exit his vehicle and was taken to the ground by a Wyandotte police officer. A second officer applied a Taser to Roquemore when he declined to put his hands behind his back during arrest.
He was arrested for fleeing and eluding, resisting arrest and the warrant from Taylor for assaulting a police officer.
A small amount of marijuana and a marijuana “roach” were found in the Roquemore’s car, along with a loaded 9-millimeter magazine.
About 12 grams of an unknown white powdery substance found in the vehicle field tested negative to being cocaine. Officers seized $1,824 found on Roquemore.
According to the report, during the police chase, Downriver Central Dispatch received a call from a woman identifying herself as Roquemore’s girlfriend and owner of the Marquis. She said she had been on the phone with him during the chase and wanted to know if he was OK.