Man sentenced to 20 to 45 years for fatal deputy crash

LANSING – Standing behind a lectern on the third floor of Veterans Memorial Courthouse and holding her son’s badge, Mary Whitaker talked about the what-ifs.

What if John Kelsey had stopped when her son, Ingham County Sheriff’s Deputy Grant Whitaker, tried to pull him over in the early hours of Dec. 7? What if Kelsey had been charged, bailed out, back at home in time for Christmas and then back on the road, possibly driving intoxicated, putting people at risk? she asked.

“God hands Grant a torch, saying, ‘It’s time to stop him, Grant,’” she said of the ensuing chase, in which Grant Whitaker lost control of his patrol car and then lost his life. “Our son paid the ultimate price for answering the call of God. I can hear Grant’s voice in response — ‘Let’s do this.’”

She asked Ingham County Circuit Court Judge James Jamo to finish what her son started.

“This very torch, that came from the hand of God on the early morning hours of Dec. 7, 2014, over seven months ago, burns just as brightly today as it did the moment Grant first held it in his own hand,” she said. “The duty assignment has not changed. The mission is not yet complete. The time has come to stop John Coryell Kelsey II and stop him for good.”

Jamo sentenced Kelsey, 35, to 20 to 45 years in prison. He also ordered Kelsey to pay $41,786.83 in restitution to the Ingham County Sheriff’s Office for a new patrol car and $9,664.75 to Whitaker’s family. Those amounts can be appealed during a restitution hearing.

During the nine-day trial, Kelsey was clean shaven and wore a suit. During the sentencing hearing he wore an orange inmate jumpsuit. The beard, which was seen in evidence photos during the trial, was starting to grow back.

He has multiple previous criminal convictions for driving with a suspended or revoked license, records show, including in 2000 in Livingston County, which included fleeing police.

He’s been convicted 15 times and been on probation four times, Ingham County Assistant Prosecutor Jonathan Roth said.

It was those previous convictions, which a judge rules couldn’t be admitted as evidence during the trial, that led to Kelsey being charged as a habitual offender. As a result, the 15-year maximum sentence on the fleeing police charge was increased.

Kelsey, speaking before his sentencing, said he was wrongly convicted and accused Michigan State Police of focusing on him when evidence said otherwise and accused troopers of giving false testimony as witnesses.

“First and foremost I feel the need to express my deepest condolences to Deputy Grant Whitaker’s grief stricken family, friends and loved ones,” he said. “I can’t begin to image the pain, sorrow and agony that you all have to endure in life without him.

“This senseless tragedy could have easily been prevented had the driver of that vehicle just pulled over. I am so very, very sorry for everyone’s loss and my heart truly goes out to Grant’s family. I hope and pray that you’ll find forgiveness for the people involved in initiating the chase.”

According to testimony during his trial: Kelsey had been out drinking with friends before leaving the Dam Site Inn, a bar in Pinckney, shortly after closing and driving west towards Stockbridge.

The chase started when a large white SUV drove by Whitaker and Deputy Richard Hoeksema.

That SUV was never recovered and was a central piece of the trial. There was testimony that Kelsey’s father owned a white Yukon Denali XL, that Kelsey was driving a large white SUV that night and that Kelsey was seen “swapping out” a vehicle on Dec. 7 with a friend who was a metal scrapper.

The prosecution presented video and photo evidence from several cameras showing a large white SUV. That evidence included Kelsey leaving the bar in a large white SUV and driving west.

Ingham County Sheriff Gene Wriggelsworth called Whitaker’s death “unnecessary” and “tragic” during a press conference after the hearing.

“State police assembled the pieces of the puzzle and the prosecutor’s office put them together,” he said. “This wasn’t a slam dunk case, as you know, and I just think the prosecutor’s office did a tremendous job in ensuring that justice was served here.”

The courtroom was filled Wednesday with Whitaker’s friends and family, along with deputies and administrators from the Ingham County Sheriff’s Office. Many had to stand in the center aisle and the crowd spilled into an inner courtroom hallway.

Mary Whitaker spoke for nearly 40 minutes about the future her son won’t have and what the family went through the day of the crash and the weeks that followed. Many in the crows started to cry.

She described what it was like as Ingham County Sheriff’s Office officials came to her home and told her and her husband, Clyde Whitaker, that their son had died. She talked about visits to the homes of their three other children to tell them the news.

The questions on their faces when they opened the door, she said, were answered each time with the same sentence, “Grant was killed this morning.”

“Why?” she asked. “Because John Coryell Kelsey II has no concern for anyone but himself. As we buried a son, John Kelsey is plotting how he will disappear, slither out of reach, out of sight.”

Kelsey was arrested the day after Whitaker’s funeral. He had a toothbrush, toothpaste and $300 in cash on him at the time, according to testimony.

Mary Whitaker recounted the moment she and her husband saw their son’s body before the funeral and what she asked him.

“How did I not know this happened to you?” she asked. “How did I sleep when you needed me? Where was the jolt, the bolt of lightning, the snap that would have alerted me to something that had happened to you? Why did I not know this? I am your mother. I should have known.

“I wasn’t meant to know until the timing was just right. And Grant did not need me. He was instantly and painlessly taken into the arms of the Lord.”

Contact Matt Mencarini at (517) 267-1347 or mmencarini@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @MattMencarini.