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In the early<\/span> hours of January 6, 2026, two 911 callers near Ypsilanti, Michigan, reported a white van driving erratically.\u00a0<\/p>\n Within an hour, police had found a white van, crashed into it twice on purpose, and fired 27 shots at the driver while the vehicle lay on its side, burning. At least eight <\/strong>cops watched as 34-year old Navy veteran John Andrew Jenuwine bled out and died inside.<\/p>\n Of several inconsistencies in the police response, one stood out: The only physical description provided to the dispatcher was that \u201ctwo Black guys\u201d were driving the van, and a caller said they\u2019d brandished a handgun at his wife. Jenuwine was white, driving alone, and unarmed.<\/p>\n That\u2019s not what police told Jenuwine\u2019s parents when they contacted them the following evening, 17 hours after killing their son.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were told that there was an exchange of gunfire, and that John was killed,\u201d John\u2019s father, Larry Jenuwine, told The Intercept. \u201cCall it na\u00efvet\u00e9 or whatever you want to call it, but our first thoughts were, \u2018Oh my God, what did he do, why did he cause this?\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n On the phone with Larry and Kelly, John\u2019s mother, a deputy with the Washtenaw County Sheriff\u2019s Office claimed their recently deceased son had a gun. But Jenuwine, an industrial field engineer traveling to repair million-dollar lasers, just had his work equipment; no gun was ever found in his van. And the officers who caused two intentional collisions appear to have violated their own policies, which the department updated after the police killing of George Floyd \u2014 testing the limits of post-2020 police reforms.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were told that there was an exchange of gunfire, and that John was killed. Come to find out, he didn\u2019t do anything to cause any of this.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n The Jenuwine family is now suing Washtenaw County and eight sheriff\u2019s deputies who responded to the case for wrongful death; for violating John\u2019s constitutional rights to protection under the law, and against unreasonable searches and seizures; and for gross negligence and willful misconduct, including improper use of deadly force. The suit seeks to hold the county responsible for what it calls the sheriff\u2019s failures to train officers and enforce its policies.<\/p>\n \u201cCome to find out, he didn\u2019t do anything to cause any of this,\u201d Larry said. \u201cHe was not the guy that they were supposed to be chasing.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Less than 15 minutes<\/span> elapsed between the time Washtenaw County Sheriff\u2019s deputies incorrectly identified Jenuwine\u2019s van and when they started shooting. Officers fired their first shots seconds after causing Jenuwine\u2019s vehicle to flip on its side and catch fire.\u00a0<\/p>\n Only seven out of the 27 shots fired hit Jenuwine. None of them alone was responsible for killing him, according to an independent autopsy obtained by Jenuwine\u2019s family and described by their attorneys in a press conference last week, which found he bled out and died over time. While Jenuwine struggled and died, dashcam footage shared with The Intercept recorded officers outside discussing whether any of the shots had hit him.\u00a0<\/p>\n After several minutes had passed, one officer said over the radio, \u201cHe\u2019s kicking around inside the vehicle right now.\u201d None of them called for emergency services.<\/p>\n According to the footage, an edited version of which was viewed by The Intercept, Jenuwine lay dying in the van for at least five minutes.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe cruelty of it, I suppose, is what strikes me the most,\u201d said Maura Battersby, one of the attorneys representing the family. \u201cIf aid had been rendered, he may have survived this.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Of the four deputies attorneys said fired shots, two names have been publicly released: Jacob Gombos and Jonathan Early. Both received awards in 2024 for distinguished service; Gombos got the department\u2019s Life Saving Award.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf aid had been rendered, he may have survived this.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n The sheriff\u2019s office placed Gombos, Earley, and the other deputies involved on paid administrative leave pending an investigation by Michigan State Police, which was completed last month and is now pending review by the Michigan attorney general. The state AG will decide whether to bring criminal charges against any of the officers in the case.\u00a0<\/p>\n A spokesperson for the Michigan State Police confirmed that their investigation is closed and referred questions to the attorney general\u2019s office, which did not respond to a request for comment. Spokespeople for the Washtenaw County Sheriff\u2019s Office and the Ypsilanti Police Department did not respond to requests for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n One of the officers who shot at Jenuwine had received the department\u2019s Life Saving Award.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n The case has brought renewed scrutiny to the Washtenaw County Sheriff\u2019s Office, which is currently facing dual lawsuits from whistleblowers<\/a> who claimed the department hired unqualified<\/a> officers and fired them in retaliation for reporting it. Both plaintiffs are former office staff who said they were fired after raising concerns that Sheriff Alyshia Dyer and other staff pushed them to hire candidates who had lied about their qualifications and in one case had an \u201cextensive\u201d criminal history. Another sheriff\u2019s deputy resigned in March<\/a> while under investigation for allegedly having a sexual relationship with a subordinate officer. Dyer herself was also independently investigated last year after a partially burned cannabis cigarette was found in her county-issued vehicle. (She denied it was hers, and an independent report could not determine whether the joint belonged to Dyer.)<\/p>\n \u201cIt seems like every day we hear something about the Washtenaw Sheriff\u2019s department,\u201d Kelly Jenuwine told The Intercept. \u201cThey are in the news constantly, and it\u2019s not for a good reason.\u201d<\/p>\n Jenuwine\u2019s killing raises<\/span> a new round of questions about the efficacy of police reform. In 2024, Michigan implemented new statewide guidelines restricting vehicle pursuits to \u201cprotect the lives of innocent bystanders.\u201d Following the police killing of George Floyd in 2020, the Washtenaw County Sheriff\u2019s office released a memo<\/a> outlining how its policies aligned with a series of proposed reforms pushed by activists<\/a> against police violence that grew out of 2014 protests in Ferguson, Missouri. And the sheriff\u2019s office adopted a new use of force policy in 2022, which classifies intentional vehicle collisions \u2014 known as a \u201cPIT\u201d maneuver, a precision immobilization technique \u2014 as deadly force.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s something you\u2019re trained not to do,\u201d said Todd Flood, the lead attorney on the Jenuwines\u2019 case.<\/p>\n The new policy also guides officers to \u201cseek voluntary compliance and operate with minimal reliance on the use of force,\u201d using techniques in crisis intervention and \u201crapport-building communication,\u201d and try to de-escalate, even after using force. It requires a mandatory medical evaluation when deadly force is applied, if an officer observes an injury, or if they believe one has occurred; and it ties the degree of appropriate force to how certain they are that the subject committed a crime. The policy states: \u201cSheriff\u2019s Office employees shall never employ excessive force.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Officers did not verbally engage with Jenuwine a single time, Battersby told The Intercept.<\/p>\n \u201cI would have expected them to be calling out over the loudspeaker,\u201d Battersby said. \u201cThere were many instances in which they were in close proximity to him, and it doesn\u2019t appear that they did that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n At a press conference after the shooting, the Washtenaw County Sheriff\u2019s Office played a dashcam video that showed Jenuwine reversing his van and driving on the wrong side of the road. Before the sheriffs hit Jenuwine\u2019s van in the first PIT maneuver, the dashcam video cuts ahead, with the video timestamp jumping forward 30 seconds.<\/p>\n\n
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