Attorney General Anthony Brown said Monday that his office sought the indictment of two Anne Arundel County Police officers because they “failed to tell the truth” about their involvement in a high-speed fatal crash.

“Had they revealed the truth, they would have been removed from the scene and placed on administrative leave pending investigation,” Brown said in a press conference.

Cpls. Kieran Schnell and Eddie Vasquez were indicted Friday in Anne Arundel County Circuit Court, according to online court records.

Schnell, 27, is charged with two counts of misconduct in office. Vasquez, 29, is charged with one count of misconduct in office.

Both Schnell and Vasquez failed to tell their supervisors they had engaged in a pursuit both in person and in written reports, said Allison Green, chief of the office’s Independent Investigation Division. Prosecutors also alleged they did not obtain authorization to engage in pursuit or radio a dispatch, never turned on their emergency lights or sirens, and did not activate their body-worn camera until they arrived at the scene of the crash.

Since 2021, Brown said, the Office of Attorney General has investigated 61 police-involved deaths, including 23 fatal car accidents. The office has conducted 23 investigations since October of last year, when state law expanded the office’s authority to prosecute all cases of police-involved deaths if it was determined there was sufficient evidence to support criminal charges. This is the first time the office has charged any officer for wrongdoing.

“Holding people accountable for their behavior keeps Maryland safe,” Brown said. “And that’s my greatest priority as your attorney general.”

The department’s traffic safety section investigated the crash “as a result of the officers’ misrepresentations,” Green said. An Anne Arundel County Police Department officer later told the team that their own officers may have been involved in a pursuit. The office began investigating the case on Dec. 8, 2023.

In the early hours of Dec. 7, 2023, Schnell and Vasquez followed a white sedan that was traveling 92 mph on Fort Smallwood Road, where the speed limit is 35 mph. Both officers, in separate patrol cruisers, chased him for several miles until the driver crashed into a utility pole.

The driver was transported to the hospital and later released. The front-seat passenger, 22-year-old Damione Gardner of Baltimore, was pronounced dead at the scene.

Vasquez, who has worked in the department since 2020, was parked in the 660 block of Fort Smallwood Road when four cars passed him “at roughly the same speeds.”

Private surveillance footage found the driver of the white sedan then sped up, putting greater distance between his vehicle and the other cars, as Vasquez continued to follow him. Vasquez was traveling at a speed of 115 mph as it pursued the white sedan.

The white sedan passed Schnell in the 7600 block of Fort Smallwood Road. Schnell then gave chase at a speed of 78 mph.

Peter O’Neill, Schnell’s attorney, said Saturday that his client is innocent of the charges and has never done anything that could be characterized as misconduct in office. O’Neill called the indictment “frankly outrageous.”

Vasquez’s attorney, Chaz Ball, declined to comment Saturday.

When reviewing the evidence, Anne Arundel County Police Chief Amal Awad said in a statement Saturday, she and her staff were “not aware of any conduct demonstrated by our officers that rises to the level of a violation of criminal law.”

“It is important to remind our community that an indictment is merely an accusation and not a finding of guilt, and our officers are presumed innocent until proven guilty,” Awad said.