The man accused of driving his Mercedes-Benz sedan through the glass doors of Detroit Metro Airport’s McNamara Terminal in January has pleaded guilty to a felony charge, but not for that crash. Brian Sutton, 37, of Clinton Township, entered a guilty plea on August 28 to one count of aggravated stalking in a separate case out of Westland, according to police, while prosecutors continue reviewing whether to file charges over the airport incident itself.
Sutton’s guilty plea, first reported by ClickOnDetroit, resolves a case that began when Westland police arrested him on February 13 on a charge of aggravated stalking. That arrest came about three weeks after the airport crash that first put his name in headlines. Sutton was identified by law enforcement as the driver behind the wheel when a car smashed through McNamara Terminal’s entrance, according to FOX 2 Detroit.
The January 23 crash unfolded around 7:30 p.m., when Sutton drove a 2024 Mercedes-Benz 300 sedan in the far-left lane before making a sharp 90-degree turn, according to CBS News Detroit. The vehicle smashed through glass entrance doors and struck a Delta Air Lines ticketing desk inside the terminal, which sits in Wayne County and serves as a major hub exclusively for Delta, its SkyTeam alliance partners, and WestJet within an airport system that handled over 16 million passenger enplanements in 2024, per background compiled by the Michigan Legislature.
Chaos Inside the Terminal
Sutton nearly hit travelers inside the terminal before the car came to a stop at the Delta counter. Surveillance and eyewitness footage showed him wearing an Amon-Ra St. Brown Detroit Lions jersey, shouting inside the terminal, and attempting to run toward a TSA checkpoint before officers tackled him, according to the report from PYOK. Police arrested him at the scene, and officials said he was experiencing a mental health crisis, per police…