Unlicensed motorist pleads guilty to hitting, killing Burnsville priest riding bike

ST. PAUL — A man who was driving with a revoked license when he fatally struck a Burnsville priest in Rosemount in 2021 pleaded guilty to criminal vehicular homicide on Tuesday, Jan. 2.

Trejean Derrell Curry, 28, of St. Paul, had been previously convicted nine times for driving without a license prior to hitting the Rev. Dennis Keith Dempsey as the 73-year-old rode his bike on the shoulder of County Road 42 on Oct.

25, 2021, according to court records. Dempsey, who served the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis for 41 years, was a newly installed priest at the Church of the Risen Savior in Burnsville.

Before that, he spent 15 years at the Church of St. Dominic in Northfield. Court records show that Curry continued to drive without a license after he was charged in Dempsey’s death and released from jail on a $75,000 bond, with conditions.

Curry was cited for driving after revocation this past September after he was caught on a surveillance camera driving away from the Dakota County Courthouse in Hastings following a hearing on the criminal vehicular homicide-gross negligence charge. For pleading guilty to Dempsey’s death, prosecutors agreed to a stayed prison sentence, up to five years of probation and a 150-day jail sentence, which could be served in 30-day increments annually during probation. Judge Dannia Edwards set sentencing for Feb.

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Learn more about the news services FCC uses here . Curry was reportedly driving his girlfriend’s Ford Fusion west on County Road 42 near Auburn Avenue about 3:20 p. m.

when he struck Dempsey from behind, the March 2022 criminal complaint says. Dempsey, of Apple Valley, died at the scene. County Road 42 is a four-lane road with two eastbound and two westbound lanes separated by a grassy median.

Curry told police he was driving in the right-most westbound lane at the time of the crash, and that Dempsey swerved in front of him. However, the Minnesota State Patrol determined that Dempsey was on the shoulder of the road when Curry veered from the travel lane and struck him at between 54 and 63 mph, according to the complaint. The speed limit on that stretch of County Road 42 is 55 mph.

The State Patrol’s crash analysis found that the skid marks from Curry’s car were to the right of the solid white line that separates the travel lane from the shoulder, and that the skid mark made by Dempsey’s bicycle when he was struck was near the center of the shoulder. The car’s front license plate had a bike tire scuff mark and indentation. A month before the crash, Curry was convicted of speeding for driving 100 mph in a 70-mph zone and of driving after revocation in July 2021.

He was convicted of driving after revocation three times in both 2018 and 2019 and once in March 2021. Share Share this article News reporting News reporting Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. The Trust Project What is this? Tags Tags MINNESOTA CRIME AND COURTS PUBLIC SAFETY.