The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness

What we know about the suspect accused of killing 5 in Wisconsin parade

November 23, 2021 at 4:15 a.m. EST
Darrell E. Brooks Jr., the suspect accused of plowing through a parade in Waukesha, Wis., was captured in a Ring doorbell camera before his arrest on Nov. 21. (Video: Daniel Rider / TMX)

The man who authorities say drove his SUV into a Wisconsin Christmas parade, killing five people and injuring dozens more, had a long criminal history, court records show, including an allegation that he had used a vehicle as a weapon just weeks before.

Here’s what we know so far about Darrell E. Brooks Jr., 39, of Milwaukee, who faces five counts of intentional homicide after the deadly rampage Sunday in Waukesha.

Attempts to reach Brooks’s family and neighbors were unsuccessful Monday, and a person who answered the phone at a number associated with his address hung up when a reporter identified herself. It is unclear whether Brooks has an attorney in the Waukesha case, and a lawyer representing him in other cases said they will not do so in this case.

Recent run-ins with law enforcement

Before the incident on Main Street in Waukesha on Sunday, Brooks had been fleeing the scene of an alleged altercation involving a knife, a law enforcement official said. When police arrived at that scene, the official said, he fled in the red SUV that was later seen speeding down the parade route.

Beloved ‘Dancing Grannies’ among those killed after driver plows through Wisconsin Christmas parade

Before Sunday, there appeared to be two open cases against Brooks in Milwaukee, both accusing him of acting violently toward people connected to him. He has pleaded not guilty in both cases, and a lawyer representing Brooks in those cases, Joseph Domask, declined to comment.

Just weeks before the parade, Brooks was accused of domestic abuse and using his vehicle as a weapon. A 31-year-old woman who had a child with Brooks had told authorities that he came to her motel in Milwaukee on Nov. 2, yelled at her and took her phone before driving off, according to a criminal complaint.

The woman walked toward a gas station and Brooks followed her and told her to get in, the complaint said. She refused, and Brooks struck her in the face with his fist, according to the complaint.

When she walked away, Brooks “ran [her] over with his vehicle,” the complaint said. Officers noted that the woman had dry blood on her face, a swollen lip and “tire tracks on her left pants leg.”

Police went to Brooks’s home and saw him getting out of a maroon Ford Escape, according to the complaint. He ignored police commands to stop and ran into the home before being arrested.

One day after a driver plowed into a Christmas parade, killing six people, community members in Waukesha, Wis. are processing what happened. (Video: Laura Dyan Kezman, Lee Powell/The Washington Post)

From that altercation, Brooks faces charges of second-degree reckless endangerment, battery and disorderly conduct.

An ‘inappropriately low’ bail

Brooks was booked into the Milwaukee County Jail on Nov. 3 and released on Nov. 16, several days after paying his $1,000 cash bail and just five days before the parade.

The bail amount was “inappropriately low in light of the nature of the recent charges and the pending charges against Mr. Brooks,” the office of John Chisholm, the Milwaukee County district attorney, said in a statement on Monday. The office is “conducting an internal review” of the bail recommendation it made, the statement said.

Chisholm’s office called the bail recommendation inconsistent with its approach “toward matters involving violent crime” as well as the “risk assessment of the defendant.” Chisholm’s office did not immediately respond Monday to questions about who made the decision to set that amount of bail and whether officials were reviewing any other bail recommendations as a result of this case.

SUV crash into Wisconsin Christmas parade is latest among deadly car-ramming incidents

A long criminal history

Brooks’s path to the parade on Sunday was littered with run-ins with police and the justice system dating back more than two decades.

His criminal history stretches back to at least 1999, when he was charged with battery and later convicted, court records and filings show. In the years that followed came battery allegations, drug charges, counts of resisting law enforcement officials, some traffic violations and other charges. Authorities in Nevada also said a man with Brooks’s name and birthday was convicted there more than a decade ago of “statutory sexual seduction.”

Brooks is still facing charges in another pending case. In July 2020, he was charged with two counts of second-degree recklessly endangering someone else’s safety and another count of possessing a gun despite being convicted of a felony.

According to court documents, Milwaukee police officers went to a home on July 24, 2020, where a woman told them that Brooks had gotten into “a physical fight” with his nephew not long before a gunshot rang out, according to the woman, who was identified in a criminal complaint as Brooks’s grandmother. (A different court filing suggests the woman may have been his mother.)

Brooks proudly acknowledged his run-ins with the law, writing in a description on a website for his rap music, under the name MathBoi Fly, that “after multiple legal battles,” he “started turning the life he lived in the streets into music.”

A video of Brooks rapping shows him in front of a vehicle identical to the one authorities say he was driving on Sunday down Main Street.

Holly Bailey and Devlin Barrett contributed to this report.