FLINT, Mich. – James Thompson was the first to die.
The 75-year-old Navy veteran had just taken four neighborhood boys for haircuts when an SUV whose driver was fleeing the police smashed into his car with such force that the impact ruptured his brain.
Four months later, two Michigan troopers chased a driver through Flint at more than 120 mph until he broadsided a car and killed a 42-year-old nursing assistant.
The next month, when a driver without a seatbelt wouldn’t pull over, a Michigan trooper chased him, ran a red light and killed a grandmother coming home from a beauty shop.
The month after that, a speeding motorcyclist fleeing a trooper hit an oncoming car and died.
All four chases happened in 2014, all within 4 miles of one another. And all shared one other characteristic: Everyone killed was black.