Ohio Attorney General details Cleveland police chase route, asks for video in investigation

CLEVELAND - The Ohio Attorney General’s office has released a map of the chase that ended with two people being shot to death.

On Nov. 29, Cleveland police said an officer heard shots fired from a car near the Cuyahoga County Justice Center on St. Clair Avenue. That started a chase that lasted less than 25 minutes and stopped in East Cleveland.

The Bureau of Criminal Investigation is hoping any businesses along the chase route will notify them if they have surveillance video.

“We want to make sure this investigation is as thorough as possible,” Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine said, in a news release on Monday. “If you have a camera that recorded only a few seconds of the pursuit, our BCI agents would like to see it.”

According to the attorney general’s office, this is the path the chase followed:

1. South on Ontario Street into Public Square
2. West on Superior Avenue and across the Detroit-Superior Bridge
3. South on West 45th Street
4. West on Lorain Avenue
5. South on West 85th Street
6. East on Clark Avenue
7. South on West 14th Street
8. East on Quigley Road
9. South on Steelyard Drive
10. North on 176/Jennings Freeway
11. North on Interstate 71
12. East on Interstate 90
13. South on East 72nd Street
14. West on St. Clair Avenue
15. South on East 68th Street
16. East on Bliss Avenue
17. South on East 71st Street
18. South on Addison Road
19. East on Star Avenue
20. South on East 79th Street
21. West on Decker Avenue
22. South on Addison Road
23. East on Wade Park Avenue (into East Cleveland)
24. South on East 118th Street
25. East on Euclid Avenue
26. South on Wymore Avenue

Cleveland police officers fired 137 shots killing the driver, 43-year-old Timothy Russell, and his passenger, 30-year-old Malissa Williams, in the parking lot of Heritage Middle School on Terrace Road.

Anyone with surveillance cameras along these roads should call the BCI, if they have not already done so, at 855-BCI-OHIO.

Also on monday, East Cleveland Mayor Gary Norton, Jr. and president Cleveland's police union Jeff Follmer released new details in the on-going investigation.

"We owe the community an explanation, and we certainly owe the families of these people an explanation," said Norton, who was briefed on the investigation from his police chief.

Norton and Follmer said the investigators are wrapping up their interviews Tuesday with the 13 officers who fired their gun during the incident. Then, the investigators will begin to interview up to 15 officers who were involved in the shooting, but did not use deadly force.

Follmer, who's been present for the interviews, said those all questioning should be completed by the end of the week.

"It's stressful. Nobody wanted to use deadly force," Follmer said.

The Bureau of Criminal Investigation declined to comment on the investigation, but a spokeswoman said that it will take several months before the office releases its findings on the shooting.