A motorist is in custody after leading police on a vehicle pursuit that ended in a fatal accident in Elizabeth overnight, acting Union County Prosecutor Grace H. Park announced Saturday.
Multiple criminal charges are pending against Danny Clyde Burnam, a.k.a. Danny Clyde Williams, 57, who has known
addresses in California and Colorado.
At approximately midnight, Burnam was driving a Freightliner cab-style commercial tractor in the area of First Street and Elizabeth Avenue when he first struck a vehicle, according to a preliminary investigation by the Prosecutor’s Office that remains ongoing.
The uninjured driver of the struck vehicle attempted to get Burnam to stop, but instead he headed northwest on Elizabeth Avenue.
Moments later, near the intersection of North Broad Street and Elizabeth Avenue, an off-duty Union County Police Department officer spotted Burnam driving erratically and also attempted to intervene; during this encounter, the officer fired a single round from his service weapon.
Burnam then drove north at a high rate of speed on North Broad Street, where he struck multiple parked and moving vehicles.
When he approached the area of North Broad Street and Parker Road, where police had set up a barricade, two Elizabeth Police Department officers also fired their service weapons multiple times, striking Burnam.
Yet Burnam drove through the barricade, and approximately one half-mile north of that area, near the intersection of NorthAvenue and Newark Avenue, he collided head-on with another vehicle, killing an adult male passenger instantly and injuring the two other occupants of the vehicle.
Identification of the deceased victim remains pending notification of next of kin. The two injured victims were transported to a local hospital, while Burnam was apprehended and also hospitalized for treatment of non life-threatening injuries.
The fatal accident and the police response to this incident remain under an investigation being conducted in strict accordance with New Jersey Office of the Attorney General guidelines governing all investigations into use of deadly force by law enforcement.