(WWJ) — Last week a video of a Zoom hearing from an Ann Arbor courtroom went viral, showing the judge astonished as Corey Harris attended his hearing for a suspended license while driving his wife to the doctor's office.
Judge Cedric Simpson revoked Harris’s bond and ordered him to turn himself in by 6 p.m. the day of the hearing, May 15.
But it turns out it was all a misunderstanding due to an apparent clerical error.
Harris had originally had his license suspended in connection with a child support case with Saginaw County Friend of the Court. But all the way back in January 2022 a judge ordered the suspension to be lifted, allowing him to drive again, according to a report from WXYZ.
The report says, however, the Michigan Secretary of State’s office says it never received a clearance from the friend of the court, so the suspension was never lifted.
Harris, who spent two days in jail prior to the matter's resolution, told WXYZ the situation was "very embarrassing."
"What was I thinking? I was thinking about about getting my wife medical help. That's what I was thinking," Harris said, according to the WXYZ report. "I wasn't thinking about the fact that I got a suspended license. I don't care about all that."
A traffic stop in Washtenaw County’s Pittsfield Township in October 2023 led to Harris’s court appearance that has since gone viral.
The video initially posted to the court’s YouTube page has since been removed.
It remains unclear why Harris’s public defender or the Washtenaw County Sheriff’s Office had not solved the matter prior to last month’s hearing.
The Secretary of State’s Office has a program called Road to Restoration that is designed to help Michigan drivers navigate the process of getting their license reinstated.