Norman E. Spruiel was a 43-year-old Detroit Police Department officer with 15 years of service who was killed after an undercover homicide investigation. In the late summer of 1993 he and his partner were conducting surveillance to locate suspects wanted for the murder and mutilation of two young men. On the night of Monday, September 13, 1993, after finishing their surveillance they stopped on a dead-end section of Prairie Street, south of Lyndon, to compare notes. As Spruiel stood outside his unmarked patrol car he was struck twice in the back by rifle fire from a man not connected to the case they were working on.

The shooter later said he believed the two men were planning to rob his brother’s nearby body shop and did not know they were police officers. Officer Spruiel was taken for medical care but died three weeks after the shooting, leaving a wife and three children. The shooter was apprehended and later convicted of Spruiel’s murder, receiving an 85-year prison sentence.

If anyone knew Officer Spruiel, his activities that night, or saw anything on Prairie Street around September 13, 1993, please share what might help clarify the events.