Man Who Killed 6 at Waukesha Christmas Parade Sentenced to Multiple Life Sentences With No Release

Man Who Killed 6 at Waukesha Christmas Parade Sentenced to Multiple Life Sentences With No Release
Darrell Brooks makes comments regarding Waukesha County District Attorney Susan Opper as he gives his closing remarks during his sentencing in a Waukesha County Circuit Court in Waukesha, Wis., on Nov. 16, 2022. Mike De Sisti/Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel via AP, Pool
Updated:
0:00
Darrell Brooks, the man who purposely drove his SUV into a crowd at a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin, in 2021, killing six people and injuring many more, was sentenced on Nov. 16 to six consecutive life sentences with no chance of release.
Waukesha County Circuit Judge Jennifer Dorow sentenced Brooks on 76 charges, which included six counts of first-degree intentional homicide and 61 counts of reckless endangerment. It comes after a 12-person jury on Oct. 26 convicted the 40-year-old on the charges.

Each homicide count carried a mandatory life sentence. At the sentencing, Dorow decided she wouldn’t let Brooks serve any portion of those sentences on extended supervision in the community, which is the state’s current version of parole.

Wisconsin doesn’t have the death penalty.

In addition to the life sentences, Dorow sentenced Brooks to 762 years in prison on the counts of reckless endangerment.

“Frankly, Mr. Brooks, no one is safe from you,” the judge said. “This community can only be safe if you are behind bars for the rest of your life. ... You left a path of destruction, chaos, death, injury, and panic as you drove seven or so blocks through the Christmas parade.”

Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Jennifer Dorow listens as Darrell Brooks gives his closing remarks during his sentencing in a Waukesha County Circuit Court in Waukesha, Wis., on Nov. 16, 2022. (Mike De Sisti/Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel via AP, Pool)
Waukesha County Circuit Court Judge Jennifer Dorow listens as Darrell Brooks gives his closing remarks during his sentencing in a Waukesha County Circuit Court in Waukesha, Wis., on Nov. 16, 2022. Mike De Sisti/Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel via AP, Pool
On Nov. 21, 2021, Brooks drove his red Ford Escape through a Christmas parade held in downtown Waukesha, located about 15 miles west of downtown Milwaukee. Six people were killed, including an 8-year-old boy. The other deaths included four women between the ages of 52 and 79, as well as an 81-year-old man.
District Attorney Susan Opper had asked Dorow on Nov. 15 to make the sentences consecutive so that they stack up “just as he stacked victims up as he drove down the road.”

Mental Illness Justification Rejected

Prior to Dorow’s announcement of the life sentences, which had garnered applause from those seated in the gallery, Brooks told the court that he has had a mental illness since he was young and didn’t plan to drive into the route of the parade.

He also apologized to those injured and those who lost loved ones as a result of the incident. It marked his first apology to them.

“I want you to know that not only am I sorry for what happened, I’m sorry that you could not see what’s truly in my heart,” he said. “That you cannot see the remorse that I have.”

Brooks told the court that the incident “was not, not, not an attack” and that it “was not planned, plotted.”

“This was not an intentional act,” he said. “No matter how many times you say it over and over, it was not.”

Waukesha Police Chief Dan Thompson last year noted that the incident wasn’t terrorism-related.

Brooks also didn’t explain why he drove through the crowd or share further about what he was thinking at the time of the deadly incident.

When Dorow asked him what sentence he thought he should get, he didn’t answer directly but said, “I just want to be helped.”

Brooks had represented himself during his trial. In remarks to Dorow on Nov. 16, he said he grew up without his father’s presence, was physically abused, and suffered from mental health issues. He also said he took medication and stayed at mental health facilities for short periods.

Brook’s family members—his mother and grandmother—asked Dorow to place Brooks in a mental institution instead of prison. Dawn Woods, Brooks’s mother, asked the judge to make sure Brooks receives treatment in prison.

“If they have to stay for the rest of their lives away from society, at least they’re getting the help they need to become mentally well,” she told the judge.

Mary Edwards, Brooks’s grandmother, told Dorow that Brooks has been bipolar since he was 12 and that the disorder had caused him to drive into the crowd.

But Dorow said she doesn’t think Brooks has a mental illness. The judge noted that four psychologists who evaluated him said he suffers from an antisocial personality disorder but not a mental illness.

Police investigate after a vehicle plowed through a Christmas parade, leaving multiple people dead and injured in Waukesha, Wis., on Nov. 21, 2021. (Mike De Sisti/USA TODAY NETWORK/Reuters)
Police investigate after a vehicle plowed through a Christmas parade, leaving multiple people dead and injured in Waukesha, Wis., on Nov. 21, 2021. Mike De Sisti/USA TODAY NETWORK/Reuters

‘Inappropriately Low’ Bond

The Milwaukee District Attorney’s Office said last year that Brooks should have been in jail after an arrest weeks prior to the Christmas parade incident but was released on an “inappropriately low” bond.

Specifically, Brooks was out on $1,000 cash bail after he allegedly assaulted the mother of his child at a Milwaukee gas station on Nov. 2, 2021, according to court documents.

The bail recommendation wasn’t “consistent with the approach of the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office toward matters involving violent crime, nor was it consistent with the risk assessment of the defendant prior to setting of bail,” the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office said in a statement on the day following the deadly Christmas parade incident.
At the time of the incident, Brooks also had a separate pending case in Milwaukee from July 2020, when he was charged with reckless endangering and illegal possession of a firearm, court documents show. Bail in the case was set at $10,000 before it was reduced to $7,500 and then to $500, records show.
Other documents show that he has a criminal record dating back to at least 1999. There’s also a warrant out for Brooks in Nevada for allegedly not appearing at a 2016 court hearing in which he was scheduled to answer a charge for failing to notify officials about moving while on the Nevada state sex offender list for a 2006 felony conviction.
Jack Phillips and The Associated Press contributed to this report.