Man gets 7 years for hitting cop SUV while fleeing

A 21-year-old man who sped away from authorities on I-43 before exiting the freeway in Port Washington and slamming into a parked police department vehicle so hard the crash totaled the police SUV in 2022 was sentenced Monday to seven years in prison by an Ozaukee County Circuit Judge who called Amarian S. Graham a “demonstrative danger to the public.”

Judge Steve Cain also sentenced Graham, a Rockford, Ill., resident who along with the passenger in his vehicle ran across the freeway after the crash in an attempt to escape officers, to five years of extended supervision following his incarceration.

Cain followed the sentencing recommendation of Ozaukee County Assistant District Attorney Benjamin Lindsay, although he called it “generous” given Graham’s long juvenile record of serious crimes.

“Your character is colored by the atrocious record you’ve accumulated in a really short time, and you’re only 21,” Cain told Graham during the April 8 sentencing hearing.

Graham, who as a juvenile was found delinquent in cases involving battery, vehicle theft and the aggravated use of a weapon, according to Lindsay, pleaded guilty in  December to second-degree recklessly endangering safety, fleeing an officer causing bodily harm or property damage and bail jumping, all felonies, in the Ozaukee County case.

Other charges against Graham were dismissed as part of a plea agreement but read into the record, which meant Cain could consider them when sentencing him. Among those charges was one for possession of a firearm by a person adjudicated of a felony-level crime as a juvenile that stemmed from the discovery of a Glock 9mm handgun in the vehicle Graham was driving. The gun had a bullet in the chamber and was fitted with a high-capacity drum magazine loaded with 26 rounds of ammunition.

At the time of the Port Washington crash, Graham was on probation for a weapons conviction in adult court, Lindsay said.

Cain said that in addition to protecting the public, Graham’s sentence needs to serve as a deterrent to those who consider fleeing from officers in vehicles.

“This is an extremely serious offense because you put the public at great, great risk,” Cain said. “These types of fleeing incidents are all too common these days, and this court has had enough of it. And I think the public has had enough of it.”

According to a criminal complaint, Graham was driving a 2008 Acura MDX north on I-43 at 11:10 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2022, when he sped past an Ozaukee County sheriff’s deputy. The deputy tried to catch up to the SUV, but it accelerated away from him.

The deputy activated his squad car’s emergency lights and the Acura slowed to about 50 mph while passing another deputy on I-43 before racing away at speeds of about 100 mph.

The deputies chased the SUV for about 45 seconds, then broke off the pursuit.

A minute later, Port Washington police officer Noah Narlock, who had been advised of the fleeing vehicle and was parked on the shoulder of the northbound I-43 on-ramp on the north side of Port, reported that the SUV exited I-43 and was attempting to get back on the freeway when it slammed into the back of his squad car.

“The (police) car was completely totaled,” Lindsay said. “There could have been catastrophic consequences for officer Narlock,” who was in the police vehicle at the time but was not seriously injured.

Narlock saw Graham and the passenger in the SUV, Anthony M. Blan, get out of the Acura. Despite Narlock’s orders to stop, the men ran across all four lanes of I-43 toward Plier’s Full Circle.

Narlock chased them until other officers arrived, then was taken by ambulance to an area hospital to be evaluated.

Deputies spotted Blan near the restaurant and arrested him at gunpoint.

Deputies and police dogs were searching for Graham when a woman who lives immediately north of the restaurant told them that a man was on her back porch.

Officers found Graham hiding under an overturned planter in the woman’s yard.

Officers who searched the SUV said it smelled of marijuana and was filled with women’s clothing and purses, as well as children’s items. In addition to the gun, officers found a burnt marijuana cigar, two bags that contained marijuana and a scale, according to the complaint.

During Monday’s sentencing hearing, Graham’s lawyer, Frederick Klimetz, said, “Unfortunately for Mr. Graham, he had a very difficult life.”

His father was killed by a drunken driver when Graham was 5. His mother died a short time later and Graham was raised by his grandmother until she died, Klimetz said.

“He grew up pretty much without any supervision after that,” he said.

Cain said, “That’s a shame, but you’re a 21-year-old man. There are a lot of people who have had troubling lives,” but that is not an excuse for a life of crime.

Graham apologized for his actions and said he has a son who is about to turn 2 to support.

“I really don’t want to miss out on his life,” he said.

Graham also said the gun found in the vehicle he was driving was not his, but Lindsay, who noted that both Graham and Blan were prohibited from possessing a gun because of prior convictions, said investigators uncovered videos Graham had uploaded to social media sites showing him with a gun that was “an apparent exact match” to the weapon found in the SUV.

Restitution was also an issue during the hearing. While Klimetz didn’t contest the amount of money Graham owes the City of Port Washington and its insurers— more than $34,000 — he asked Cain to find that Graham does not have the means to pay it. Cain said he would not make that finding now.

“You have to pay for some of the monetary damage you have done,” he told Graham.

Cain made Graham eligible for the Challenge Incarceration Program after he has served 5-1/2 years of his sentence. That program allows inmates to earn early release from prison by participating in such things as counseling and treatment and performing manual labor.

Blan, 24, who lived in Illinois at the time of his arrest, pleaded guilty to one felony count of possession of a firearm by an out-of-state felon and possession of marijuana, a misdemeanor, in August and was sentenced by Cain in October to two years in prison and two years of extended supervision.