An off-duty north suburban police officer was killed in a single-car crash early Saturday in Gurnee.
Waukegan police officer Jason J. Mueller was driving about 2:20 a.m. Saturday near Washington Street and Route 45 in Gurnee when his 2007 Nissan Xterra SUV hit a ComEd utility pole about 20 feet off the roadway, Gurnee Deputy Police Chief Saundra Campbell said.
Mueller, 27, of Grayslake, was found after another driver reported a vehicle against a utility pole, Campbell said. Mueller had been ejected from the vehicle, according to the Lake County Coroner’s office.
The SUV was westbound on Washington when it left the road near Hillview Drive, the last street before Washington curves into Route 45.
Mueller, who was off-duty at the time, was taken to Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville, where he died later Saturday, Campbell said. He died of head trauma from being ejected from the vehicle, the coroner’s office said.
Coroner’s office chief deputy Orlando Portillo said there would not be an autopsy performed on Mueller.
Initial examination “clearly shows the cause of death was head trauma after he was ejected out of the vehicle,” he said.
Toxicology tests are being run, but coroner’s office equipment is not working so they sent it to an outside laboratory, Portillo said. Results are expected to take about four weeks.
The crash remains under investigation, Campbell said, and it’s unknown where Mueller was coming from or going at the time. Investigators are waiting on results of a coroner’s report, she added.
“It’s a relatively straightforward crash,” Campbell said.
He was hired as an officer in Waukegan in September 2013 and assigned to the department’s Patrol Division, Waukegan police said.
He served in the U.S. Army from 2006 to 2012, as an Army Ranger, doing two tours of active combat duty in Afghanistan and one in Iraq.
“Although Officer Mueller was with the WPD for less than a year, he will be greatly missed,” Chief Wayne Walles said in the statement. “He was known as an aggressive officer that loved working out in his down time.”
Mueller is survived by his wife, Katie, and young daughter, Ava.
