New Hampshire authorities releasing new information about a deadly police pursuit that stretched across state lines earlier this summer.
The driver, Michael Brown, of Presque Isle, Maine, was shot and killed by four troopers on June 15 after he took them on a 40-mile chase from Malden, Massachusetts, to Newton, New Hampshire.
In a report, the Attorney General is now justifying the use of deadly force by the troopers.
During a press conference Wednesday afternoon, Jeffrey Strelzin, the Senior Assistant New Hampshire Attorney General, told reporters the suspect planned suicide by police and told his family he, “wasn’t going down without a fight.”
Authorities say after being accused of sexual assault by a family member in Presque Isle, Brown stole a pickup truck and a loaded .9 mm pistol from his uncle and went on the run.
“From the start, he made it clear he never intended to be taken alive,” Strelzin said.
Brown was later spotted by officers in Malden, Massachusetts, and took off.
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Spike strips didn’t stop him, he drove the wrong way on Interstate 495, and eventually fired six different times at officers before losing control of his car in New Hampshire. That’s when he opened fire for the final time at a rest stop.
Four Massachusetts troopers fired back. Brown died of a single gunshot wound to his neck.
In Brown’s vehicle, investigators found that stolen pistol and a handwritten note from his mom.
“You’re my son,” Strelzin read out loud. “And I’ll always love you.”
An autopsy showed that substances found in marijuana, amphetamines and methamphetamines were in Brown's blood.
Strelzin and leaders of both the Massachusetts and New Hampshire state police forces commended all four troopers for their bravery and courage that night.
They are all now back on the job.
