A chaotic police pursuit on Interstate 93 North near Boston ended in a crash Wednesday morning, leaving a damaged SUV at the scene and triggering a rush-hour standstill that stretched delays to as long as two hours. Dashcam video captured a driver weaving through heavy traffic just moments before the crash, and troopers took at least one person into custody near the wreckage.
The crash happened near the Granite Avenue interchange on the northbound side of I-93, according to Boston 25 News, which first reported on the footage. That stretch of highway sits along the Neponset River border between Milton and Boston's Dorchester neighborhood, a spot known as a critical commuter bottleneck where surface roads feed directly into the expressway, according to the Boston Region MPO.
Video reviewed by the outlet appeared to show Massachusetts State Police cruisers engaged in an active chase before the crash, with the driver weaving through heavy traffic in the moments leading up to impact. Additional dashcam footage showed a large emergency response descending on the scene, first responders working amid the wreckage as rush-hour traffic came to a standstill around them. The report described injuries as unclear immediately after the chase and crash.
Gridlock Radiates Across the Region
The timing could hardly have been worse for commuters. This stretch of the Southeast Expressway regularly carries more than 200,000 vehicles a day, making it one of the highest-density highway corridors in New England, per the Boston Region MPO's traffic data. Add in the fact that MassDOT runs a reversible HOV zipper lane on this same stretch of I-93 northbound between 6 and 10 a.m. on weekdays, and there's little room for cars to maneuver around an incident during the morning crunch.
Greater Boston has previously been ranked the most congested metro area in the country by traffic analytics firm INRIX, with Southeast Expressway travel times routinely doubling during peak hours even without a crash to contend with, according to Boston Indicators. Once this pursuit ended in a crash, that congestion snowballed, with delays reported reaching up to two hours as backups rippled outward from the scene.
What Happens Next for the Driver
Boston 25 News said it was investigating what led up to the crash and had reached out to police for more information; the outlet's reporting, credited to Frank O'Laughlin, noted the story was still developing as of Wednesday. The driver's identity, the cause of the pursuit, and whether any other vehicles were struck before the arrest near Granite Avenue remain unknown.
Whatever charges eventually emerge, Massachusetts law sets out clear penalties for drivers who try to outrun police on the highway. Refusing to stop when signaled by a uniformed officer is a criminal misdemeanor under state law carrying a $100 fine and the possibility of a license suspension by the Registry of Motor Vehicles, according to the Boston Crime Defense Lawyer firm. Reckless or negligent operation that endangers the public carries steeper consequences, up to two years in a house of correction, fines as high as $500, and a minimum 60-day license suspension for a first offense, per the Serpa Law Office — and prosecutors do not need to prove a crash actually occurred to win a conviction.
A Pattern State Police Are Trying to Break
Wednesday's chase adds to a string of recent highway pursuits and crashes along I-93 that Hoodline has tracked in recent months, including a chase that ended in a Braintree smashup in July. State troopers have engaged in hundreds of pursuits in recent years — internal logs previously obtained by Boston 25 News showed 1,120 vehicle pursuits statewide between 2018 and 2021, including 164 in just the first ten months of 2021. Department policy requires that the necessity of catching a suspect outweigh the public safety risk the chase itself creates.
To cut down on those risks, Massachusetts State Police began deploying StarChase GPS projectile technology in October 2024, allowing troopers to tag and remotely track fleeing vehicles instead of engaging in prolonged high-speed pursuits, according to Police1. The agency was reportedly the first in the Northeast to pilot the tool. State leaders have also ramped up enforcement more broadly; Governor Maura Healey reported in July that a multi-agency crackdown on reckless highway driving and illegal road meetups produced 232 civil citations, 20 criminal summonses, and seven arrests in a single weekend.
