DeKalb County police chases jumped from 17 in 2024 to 99 in 2025 after CEO Lorraine Cochran-Johnson authorized a policy expanding pursuits to nonviolent property crimes. One of those chases, on April 16, killed a grandmother walking her grandson home from school in a school zone.
The numbers come from data DeKalb submitted to the Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police, reported Aug. 6 by WABE and Decaturish. The county also reported 28 pursuit-related injuries in 2025, including two serious injuries to a chase passenger and an uninvolved bystander. Three officers received minor injuries.
"Obviously there was a change in policy down there," GACP Executive Director Butch Ayers said of DeKalb. "The number certainly jumped out."
Only the Richmond County Sheriff's Office logged more chases among agencies reporting to GACP in 2025, Ayers said.
The policy shift
When Cochran-Johnson took office in 2025, she directed the interim police chief to expand chase authority. A memo formalizing the change was reported by Decaturish on March 31, 2025. The new rules also authorized the PIT maneuver, a technique in which officers strike a suspect's vehicle to force a spinout.
The Police Executive Research Forum recommended in 2023 that departments limit chases to violent crimes or imminent threats to life. DeKalb's expansion moved in the opposite direction.
A county spokesperson said all 99 pursuits in 2025 were found compliant with policy through administrative review. No pursuit-related fatalities occurred that year.
Fatal school-zone chase
That changed on April 16, 2026. At approximately 3:30 p.m., a Flock license-plate-reader camera flagged a stolen 2024 Mitsubishi Mirage. An officer attempted a traffic stop at Panola Road and Snapfinger Woods Drive. The driver, Joseph Odeh, 18, of Fairburn, fled northbound on Panola Road at speeds exceeding 90 mph in a 45-mph zone.
The chase ended when Odeh crashed at Miller Road and Covington Highway, near Miller Grove Middle School. Antoinette Catchings, 56, was walking her 14-year-old grandson Robert Stuckey home from school. Catchings was killed. Stuckey was airlifted to the hospital with serious injuries.
The crash occurred inside the school zone during the afternoon dismissal window, which runs from 3:45 to 4:25 p.m. DeKalb's own chase policy explicitly prohibits pursuing "in areas with heavy pedestrian traffic, e.g. sidewalks, shopping centers, active school zones."
Public records reviewed by Decaturish show the officer abandoned a planned PIT maneuver "due to increased traffic volume and concern for public safety" but continued the pursuit. The officer's report states Odeh lost control while attempting a sharp left turn.
A DeKalb County grand jury indicted Odeh on July 9 on seven charges including felony murder, vehicular homicide and fleeing police. An additional felony elder-abuse charge was filed in July.
The county spokesperson confirmed the pursuit is scheduled for review by the department's Internal Review Board and that Catchings' death is the subject of pending litigation. Officials declined to answer further questions.
Chases cross into Dunwoody and Brookhaven
DeKalb pursuits don't stay in unincorporated DeKalb. On June 3, 2025, a high-speed chase that began in Brookhaven crossed into unincorporated DeKalb and then into Dunwoody, ending in a crash at Peachtree Industrial Boulevard and I-285, according to Appen Media. Three teenagers were arrested. That chase involved an aggravated assault suspect, a category pursuable under the old policy, but it illustrates how DeKalb pursuits spill across city lines.
"The pursuit originated in Brookhaven, went back into unincorporated Dekalb and DeKalb Police pursued the vehicle into the city of Dunwoody," Dunwoody Police Sgt. Michael Cheek said in June 2025.
What's next
The DeKalb County Police Department's next midyear town hall is Tuesday, Aug. 11, at 6 p.m. at 3123 Klondike Road in Stonecrest, covering the South and East precincts. No date has been announced for the Internal Review Board's examination of the April 16 chase.
