Michigan investigates fatal crash after attempted ICE traffic stop

Michigan authorities are investigating the death of a Guatemalan construction worker whose car struck a tree and caught fire after federal immigration officers tried to stop him in Grand Rapids on Sunday. The Department of Homeland Security says the officers were looking for someone else and ended their attempt to stop the vehicle when the driver fled.

Mario David Coronado Juárez, 36, was pronounced dead at the scene. Grand Rapids police said officers responded at about 7:10 a.m. to reports of a car that had crashed into a tree and caught fire. Police later confirmed that Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel had attempted to stop the vehicle before Coronado fled.

A DHS spokesperson told NBC News on Thursday that ICE officers were seeking a different Guatemalan person, who the department said was unauthorized to be in the United States, had “multiple alcohol related driving offenses” and was wanted in Guatemala on a drunk-and-disorderly charge. Officers attempted to stop Coronado’s vehicle “to confirm the identity of the driver,” the spokesperson said. When he drove away at high speed, “ICE officers immediately discontinued the enforcement action.”

The spokesperson said the officers later found the vehicle crashed and burning. They “immediately attempted to render aid and extinguish the fire” until local authorities arrived, DHS said. Only after the crash did they learn that Coronado, rather than the vehicle’s registered owner, had been driving. DHS also said Coronado was not legally present in the United States after re-entering the country following his removal by Border Patrol in 2021.

Grand Rapids Police Chief Joseph Trigg asked Michigan State Police to assist with the investigation. He said his department’s traffic investigators had been “limited in their ability” to obtain information from federal agencies. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer directed state police to conduct an independent review of the law enforcement actions surrounding the crash. State police director Col. James Grady II confirmed to NBC News that his agency was working with Grand Rapids police to investigate what led to Coronado’s death.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Hillary Scholten asked ICE’s acting director for information about the agents’ actions and requested an immediate briefing and a response by Sunday. “No traffic stop should end with a fatality. Something went wrong, and we need to know what and how,” she said, calling for “a transparent investigation into facts we don’t yet know.”

Rosario Ovando, Guatemala’s consul general in Chicago, identified Coronado and told NBC News he was from Comitancillo, in Guatemala’s San Marcos region. Members of the Grand Rapids immigration advocacy group Movimiento Cosecha said he worked in construction to support his wife and three young children in Guatemala.

“If ICE was chasing him and caused his death, we want justice,” group member Karla Barberi said. The Guatemalan Consulate will help Coronado’s family repatriate his body after authorities conclude their investigation, Ovando said.