Alex Habib was a 28-year-old Uber driver and server working to support his wife and two young children when a teenager fleeing police in a stolen car slammed into his vehicle near 11 Mile Road and Van Dyke Avenue in Warren on July 12, 2025. More than a year later, his family is channeling that loss into a golf invitational meant to help other grieving families find their footing.
The Habibiforever Foundation, established in Alex Habib's honor, will host the golf invitational Saturday in Oakland County, with proceeds benefiting the Henry Ford SandCastles grief support program. According to WDIV ClickOnDetroit, the event still has spots available and is accepting both ticket purchases and donations.
Habib's in-laws, Dale and Debbie Durant, have stepped in to help his widow, Danielle Habib, raise their two children, Eleanora and Santiago. Debbie Durant said the family wants to support other people coping with loss, and that they are still getting used to their new normal, per the same report. Dale Durant said the family wants to honor Alex Habib's legacy and help others, and the family plans to make the golf invitational an annual event.
Family Gatherings Now Carry a Different Weight
The report notes that family gatherings and birthdays can be especially difficult for the children left behind. That reality is central to why the Durants chose Henry Ford SandCastles as the fundraiser's beneficiary — a program built specifically around helping young people process the kind of loss Eleanora and Santiago now carry.
Established in 1997 by Henry Ford Hospice, SandCastles provides free, peer-based bereavement services across eight community sites in Southeast Michigan for grieving children and teens ages 3 to 18 and their families, according to Henry Ford SandCastles. The organization relies on community fundraising events like the Habib family's golf outing to keep those services free. Data compiled by the program indicates that roughly 1 in 11 Michigan children — about 201,000 youth statewide — will experience the death of a parent or sibling before turning 18, and that unaddressed childhood grief can raise the risk of long-term emotional and behavioral struggles.
The Chase That Led to Habib's Death
Prosecutors say the driver who struck Habib's car, 16-year-old Daniel Shane Canales, was fleeing Roseville police at speeds of about 130 mph in a stolen Hyundai Sonata before running a red light at the Warren intersection. As reported by ClickOnDetroit, the pursuit passed through Roseville and onto westbound I-696 before entering Warren, and involved three separate municipal police departments — Clinton Township police had initiated and then aborted an earlier chase before Roseville officers resumed it.
Canales is facing several charges as an adult, including second-degree murder and fleeing a police officer. His trial has been pushed back to December, according to the seed report. Macomb County prosecutors also revealed during earlier court proceedings that an unidentified 12-year-old was separately charged as a juvenile after allegedly stealing another vehicle at the same apartment complex, though that child was driving a separate car rather than riding with Canales.
A Prosecutor's Crackdown on Fleeing Drivers
The crash landed amid a broader surge in high-speed police pursuits across Macomb County. Fleeing and eluding incidents nearly doubled over five years, climbing from 226 cases in 2019 to 403 in 2024, with another 139 recorded in just the first half of 2025, per ClickOnDetroit. A month before Habib's death, Macomb County Prosecutor Peter J. Lucido instituted a zero-tolerance policy eliminating plea bargains for defendants charged with fleeing and eluding, while also urging state lawmakers to adopt mandatory prison sentences for the offense.
Following the crash, Habib's family and other members of the community publicly questioned whether high-speed pursuits over non-violent property crimes like auto theft put innocent bystanders at unnecessary risk, according to footage from FOX 2 Detroit. Roseville police opened an internal administrative review after the incident, while the Warren Police Department handled the fatal crash reconstruction.
Hoodline previously reported on the murder charges against the teen filed in the days after the crash. As Canales awaits his December trial, the Durants are focused tomorrow's golf invitational and on making sure Habib's name continues to support families navigating grief similar to their own.
