Charge: Driver led Minneapolis cop on chase that ended in deadly crash

Newly filed charges allege that a 19-year-old man led Minneapolis police on a high-speed chase last summer then ended when the officer collided with an SUV and killed the driver.

James J. Jones-Drain was charged Monday in Hennepin County District Court with fleeing police and auto theft in connection with the July 6, 2021, collision at a north Minneapolis intersection that killed 40-year-old Leneal Frazier of St. Paul. A warrant has been issued for Jones-Drain's arrest.

Former officer Brian Cummings faces charges of second-degree manslaughter and criminal vehicular homicide. He left the force in October, the day after the charges were filed.

Prosecutors say Cummings was driving 90 mph on residential streets when he ran a red light and entered the intersection of N. Lyndale and 41st avenues just as Frazier's Jeep was crossing it. Cummings struck the driver's side of the Jeep at about 78 mph, according to the charges against the former officer.

Frazier was the uncle of Darnella Frazier, the young woman whose cellphone video of George Floyd's death in May 2020 helped convict fired Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin of murder.

Jones-Drain has 10 pending cases in Hennepin County alleging a string of robberies, including several targeting pharmacies and a fast-food outlet shortly before the crash, according to the complaint.

Cummings' attorney referenced those cases in his failed effort in March to have the charges against the former officer dismissed. Cummings' trial is tentatively set to start in May.

According to the complaint against Jones-Drain:

Cummings spotted a Kia Sportage with no license plate near W. Broadway and N. Lyndale Avenue that matched the description of a vehicle that was carjacked three days earlier.

The vehicle sped away on Lyndale and ran a red light. Cummings pursued, and the chase involved "running several stop signs and red lights," the complaint read.

The Kia ran the red light at N. 41st and Lyndale, barely missing Frazier's SUV. The trailing Cummings hit the brakes, skidded for more than 25 yards and struck the SUV in the intersection. Frazier died about an hour later.

Surveillance video from the Target on E. Lake Street allegedly showed Jones-Drain and another man approach a woman in the parking lot about 6:20 p.m. on July 3, 2021. One of the men grabbed her keys, and they drove off with her SUV.

In the next 1½ hours, Jones-Drain robbed four retail businesses in Minneapolis and one in Robbinsdale, the complaint said.

The stolen Kia was located parked and unoccupied in south Minneapolis. The plate on the front was from a stolen Audi, and "the interior of the vehicle smelled like sulfur, and it appeared that a cleaning agent had been splashed around the vehicle in an attempt to destroy forensic evidence," the charges read.