Honor to lead our hiring process with two chiefs, huh?
You know, all the day's work, you
wouldn't be able to tell the
history Police Department without you. You know,
I appreciate,
yeah, right, yes, sir,
I think this should Have went to, you know,
it's a good Letter. Okay?
Oh, just
got a nod. You don't want to mess with Secret Service. Yeah, they were standing everywhere. That's
all right.
Thank you. Thank you.
Yeah, recording in progress.
Progress is sitting outside, sir, yes, sir.
No, I get rid of Oh
Today is Thursday, October the 24th 2024 301 the board 302 the board of police commission meeting is called to order. We do have another Commissioner outside. Hopefully, if we can get one to staff to ask them to step in so that we can get this meeting started. But in the meantime, we have Chaplain Securus Bennett. Can you open us up in prayer? Please? Thank you.
Thank you, sir, God, bless you. Can we all bow our heads Father in Jesus name, thank you for today, Lord God, we thank you for your manifold blessings, your mighty acts and your excellent greatness and kindness toward us. Lord God, Lord as we gather together, Lord God that you grant us clear to your thought, clear to your speech and clear to your mind as we carry out the work that you would have us to do for our city and our citizens, Lord God bless our mayor. On today, Deputy Mayor, Lord God bless our Chief, Chief of Police. Oh, god bless the entire board of the Detroit police commissioners. Lord God grant them all clear to your speech and clear to mind. On today. Let us come together with cohesion, peace and harmony and make it a hospice occasion. Oh God, as we carry out the work for the betterment of our community, leading God the citizens to be better citizens. Oh God, send peace to our neighborhoods, Lord. And most of all, we ask you to cease the gunfire and the gun violence in Jesus name. But we believe all things are made possible to him that believe he's in our favor. We ask in Jesus name. Thank God, amen. Amen.
Thank you very kindly. Chaplain, yes, sir.
Back in your head, yep. Um,
there's someone, uh, something for Commissioner Burton, okay, all right, yeah. So we at this particular time, we goes to the secretary report before we go to citizen comments go ahead announcements.
Announcements for the week are the next board meetings and committee meetings of the board of police commissioners. October 31 at 3pm here at public safety headquarters for November committee meeting. I'm sorry for the october 2024 committee, committee meeting schedule on next Tuesday, October 29 at 5pm Policy Committee meeting. And on Wednesday, October 30 at 6pm is the budget committee meeting for November, the board meeting schedule is as follows, November 7, 3pm at public safety headquarters. Thursday, November 14, 2024 in the community at 6:30pm which will be at Adams, but so Recreation Center, Linden Street, Detroit, and on Thursday, November 21 at 3pm vacua, public safety headquarters. You
Yes, and that is that those are the announcements are, Mr. Chair,
okay, thank you very kindly. You may introduce the commissioners.
Chairman woods, President,
Vice Chair, Smith, Commissioner Bernard,
Attorney Linda Bernard, present District Two,
Commissioner banks, Commissioner Bell
person. District
Four,
Commissioner Burton
present, district five,
Commissioner Moore has been excused. Commissioner de Walsh is excused, Commissioner Hernandez present, and Commissioner Presley here. Five, presenter, I miss someone. Yes, is six? Present I did. Did I miss? I am so sorry. Yes. I Yes. You Yes, we
do have a quorum. Thank you very kindly entertain a motion except to approve of the agenda. So moved second, moved by Commissioner Bernard, second by Commissioner Hernandez. All in favor, say, Aye. Aye. Any discussion. Anyone opposed. The motion is carried. I entertain a motion for the approval of minutes October the 10th, 2024, so moved second, move by Commissioner Bernard, second by Commissioner Hernandez. All in favor, say, Aye. Any discussion, anyone opposed. The motion is carried introduction of the BC staff and chief of police and elect officials.
Through the Chair, we have chief investigator, Jamal Warfield, Mr. Robert Brown, Miss Johnny Underwood, Miss Teresa blossom, Miss army. See a Joshua, Mary Barber, Jasmine Taylor, Felicia Tyson and drew freeze. Investigator, staff, Destiny. Stephanie. Stephanie, our interpreters for today or miss Chicago and Doctor Beatty, core reporter, Don handy side audio, Sergeant Quinn, media services, video, Mister Charles Henry, Chief James White, Chief of Police, James White, Charles Fitz, also chief Fitzgerald. Additionally, we have Marie overall state representative, Tyrone Carter's office for the butler, president of second preset community relations, Ladon Davis, Office of Councilman Fred der Hall. Andrea Vaughn, Office of State Senators, Santana lieutenant, Mark young, LSA, President, Ron Thomas, D, P, O, a vice president and former commissioner, William Davis,
thank you very kindly. And we got the great Reverend blunt out there too. The the my report, we go to the resolution. And the resolution by Commissioner Presley. Thank
you, Mr. Chair, through the chair a resolution honoring chief James E white, whereas James E White was appointed to the Detroit Police Department on January 8, 1996 upon graduation from Detroit Metropolitan Police Academy, police officer white began his career in the sixth precinct. He was also assigned to internal controls, and whereas on october 27 2000 officer White was promoted to the rank of sergeant and reassigned to the six precinct and later to NorthWestern district. I owe you. Sergeant White was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant on June 1, 2006 and assigned to the operation portfolio, and whereas on December 3, 2007 Lieutenant White was appointed to the rank of commander and assigned to the northeastern district, western district special project session, a training staff office of the assistant chief of police and Office of Civil Rights and whereas commander White was appointed to the rank of Deputy Chief on December the 20th, 2012 and reassigned to the Assistant Chief of police office on February 27 2013 a deputy chief White was appointed to the rank of Assistant Chief of Police after leaving in 2020 to become Director of the Michigan Department of Civil Rights.
He returned in August of 2021 upon his appointment as chief of police, and whereas his career demonstrated a close and effective relationship with the board of police commissioners, the vital role of civilian oversight, of law enforcement and the Detroit community in every endeavor, Chief white always showed the utmost knowledge, expertise and pride in being a public safety professional and a member of the Detroit Police Department. And whereas chief White is a graduate of Wayne County Community College and Wayne State University. He holds an Associates of Arts degree in general studies and a bachelor's degree in sociology with a concentration in psychology. He earned a masters of science and counseling from Central Michigan University, and in 2018 earned a MBA certificate from the Wayne State Leadership Academy in the Mike Ilitch School of Business. He is a member of the International Association of Chief of Police and an ex officio member of the Michigan Commission on Law Enforcement standards, a certified, excuse me, a state certified counselor. He is involved with numerous organizations in Detroit community where his contributions and leadership will continue. Now, therefore, be resolved that the Detroit board of police commissioners, speaking on behalf of Detroit Police Department and the residents of the city of Detroit, recognizes and honors the commitment and devoted spirit of Chief James E white,
his organizational leadership has been in value. Has been an invaluable asset for the entire department, and his dedication to improving public safety in the city has made the department stronger and made Detroit a better place to live, work and visit. We thank and congratulate you for a job well done. Chief James E white, board of police commissioners adopted by the Board on October the 20th well to be proposed to be adopted by the Board on october 24 2024
so moved second
motion made by Commissioner Bernard, second by Commissioner Hernandez. All in favor. Say, aye. Aye. Any discussion. Yes, ma'am. Just
to mirror not only what the resolution says, but what I think everyone this room feels and knows, and that is that Chief white first of all, we wish you, personally and professionally, the best and certainly good health for you and the persons that and your family that that, that you love, but more importantly than that, your contributions to the city of Detroit have been lifelong, and to the state of Michigan, and what you're getting ready to do new to do now is a new horizon that I'm so happy for you for because
you are a leader and an executive par excellence, And I know because I went to Harvard to learn how to do it, I'm just saying that to you, you exemplify all the characteristics, the integrity, the strength, the honor, the ability to see the big picture and not just focus on smaller, minute, issues.
I don't always agree with you on the things that you want to do or that you propose,
but I can say without hesitation that your your respect for our community, your respect for the board and and just the way you present things. It's orderly. It is, as my sister would say, precise and concise. So therefore, I certainly wish you the best you can count on my personal and professional support and your new endeavor. I think, I think they hired the best of the best. There is no candidate that they could have hired that could possibly even even even come close to your qualifications and and your personal sense of honor and responsibility. So I congratulate you. The city loves you. Everybody I met loves you. So therefore I wholeheartedly endorse this, this resolution. Thank
you so much. Yep. Any, any
other comments? Yes, sir, yeah, through
the Chair. Just very briefly, just sitting here, I think I was moved to this seat maybe three years ago, three and a half years ago, right when you were appointed. I honestly feel that I'm a better professional because of learning from you. Sitting next to you based on your empathy, based on your grace, how you show up every single day in the community into these meetings. So I just appreciate you.
Thank you very much, sir,
anything, Father, yeah, and
I'll share. Thank you to the chair.
I had the privilege of serving as chair of this board while you have been chief, and
I have really appreciated the level of openness and transparency that you provided this board. I know that it has come with some bumpy roads and rough edges, but I think throughout you have kept what was most important to the residents at heart, which will ensure that they can have full faith and confidence in the functioning and operations of our police department.
And I'm excited to see what occurs in this next chapter of your life, knowing that obviously your department, our department, deals with so many mental health crises, and figuring out what resources might be able to brought to bear in intertwined, any partnership that might exist. And so, as has been said, you know, I wish you nothing but the best in your future endeavors.
I pray greatly for our department, I know there's gone through a lot, and I'm sure that there's some heaviness and morale to lose such a great leader,
but I know that through your tenure, you have well developed, capable individuals who will stand in the gap and ensure that our department continues on this way to excellency that we've been experiencing. So again, congratulations to you. Thank you very much. Absolutely.
Any more comments? Thank you, yes, yes, sir, Chief white,
I have served with, starting with Bill Canyon and 71 chief hard, and thereafter and quite a few police chief, as you well know, I had opportunity to interact with you as chairman on four different occasion, starting in 2014 I want to say that you've been outstanding. You have achieved a whole lot in terms of your career, and I just wish you the best. I want to say to all my concerns of Chief of Police, you went to head of the class, and thank you for your service. Thank you very much.
Any further comments you want to go? Yes,
I say something through this year, Chief white good serving with you. What the three years I've been here, good serving with you. Really appreciate you and number Blessings to you as you go on, God has closed this door here, and he's opening up a new door for you and your life and nothing but Blessings to you, you and your family. Thank you, sir.
You're welcome. Okay.
I will say that all the way up into, I think we met, but yesterday, day four, yesterday, we had day before yesterday. I get caught up, you know, in the time, you know, but in his office, working on policy that's concerning this community and has always kept an open door to the street center suites met you when I was a strong activist out there in the streets, Holding police departments accountable, making sure that they get in compliance with eight can't wait in which we was able to get 10 police departments in this state in compliance with 18 weight. So we go back some ways, and I'm very your last act was a class act, and our last meeting was a very, very powerful thing, and we'll be making announcements and having discussion, robust discussion, and in terms of what we've met about. But I want to say that thank you for sacrificing your life and putting your life on the line for the citizens of the city of Detroit.
Thank you for being a leader. Thank you for even holding officers accountable. You probably one of the chiefs who will go down in history. Ron might not like this, but you know in terms of spending officers without pay. You know you've done that. You brought that to us. And you look at those numbers,
those numbers were large numbers that you brought to us, and in some cases, the board refused to go with you. I know I didn't go with you on one occasion, but you wanted to be hold officers accountable, and you have been very, very transparent with me and looking forward for you to go and serve in a capacity in which you about to serve on even a deeper level, and I'm sure that you would be a blessing to this department, even over there, because even officers and the community need mental health support and so again, thank you very kindly for your great leadership, and having said that our say All In favor. Say, aye, aye, the motion is carried. Here you go, good sir.
Skinny, you You're welcome,
yeah, let's take a group picture. Let's, let's take a group picture. You come around.
Okay? Put
the
senior guy here. Come on over here. You
can go.
Thanks to the great 123,
I appreciate thanks.
Now we'll go to the chief of police report.
Good afternoon, honorable board and thank you. I am honored and humbled and emotional and everything in between, and I'm just very thankful for the opportunity to serve as chief of this great city. And thank this board. Each and every one of you and those who are not in attendance for your support. You all selected me to be chief unanimously. It is just a great honor in my life and my career to have the privilege to serve this community and serve this department. We have the best police department in the country. I don't take that lightly. You mentioned suspensions without pay, and those are some of the most difficult things that you can ever do as a police chief, is take a member's money from them.
I've got 2700 members that I gotta keep upright. I gotta keep in a position where this community respects them, and
if there's one person who who challenges that respect and that continuity with the community. I have to do what a chief has to do.
It's never easy. I don't like taking money from officers. I don't like terminating officers, but I know if we don't get that right, then the the the officers that are left behind, the officers that have to be out here on these streets and making these decisions are going to be questioned.
I've never been a chief to say nothing to see here. I've always been the type of chief to tell you what you're looking at and explain it to the best of my ability, sometimes we agree and sometimes we don't, but oftentimes we don't necessarily walk away with an agreement, but we walk away with an understanding.
So I appreciate the board's willingness to just understand I appreciate the unions. They fight hard, and I joke with Ron a lot. And believe it or not, Ron Ken joke, I know it doesn't seem like it, and when he does, rarely laugh with me what we talk about, if I was in trouble, I would want him representing me, because he fights hard for his members. And the same with Mark. Mark is a very passionate, passionate leader, and a very passionate leader of the lieutenants and sergeants association. So, but we don't always agree, and they will be the first to tell you that, and they'll be first tell me that. But they're very, very diligent in their work. I just want to give you a brief report. You know, this board in 2021 allowed me to be chief. I walked into the these doors with some, some very, very difficult numbers to overcome. At that time, our criminal homicides were up 27% our non fatal shootings were up, 44% our sexual assaults were up, 12% our aggravated assault up, 29% our carjackings were up 23% and our overall violent crime was up 18% as of today, our homicides are down 19% our non fatal shootings are down 27% our robberies are down 18% our total Part One violent crime is down 8% and our carjackings are down 27% that's not me. That's the hard working men and women of the Detroit Police Department. A good strategy and good leadership from my deputy chief, my assistant chiefs, who work very, very hard, we should all be proud. These successes would not be possible without this community. No police department can police a community without that community's agreement. Now is that agreement? Yes, you can police me, no, but what it is is trust in that community. Is trust in that police department that allows 2700 members to police, 650,000 that did the census, another 200,000 that didn't it's because of these officers and their constant presence in this community, it's because people like Pastor Blount, who has certainly issues with some decisions made by this agency, but in a very respectful and professional way, appear here and voice those concerns and demand the best from this Police Department and others like him and yourself, when you were out as an activist and every member of this board who requires excellence from this police department. We do not take that lightly. With that, because we have had a very long presentation already, and you have the crime numbers. I'll stop there to answer any questions that this body may have for me. Any questions, what's your
last day going to be?
It looks like November 8,
a couple of weeks from now, yes. Are you immediately starting your new position? Are you going to take a break constantly
work? It'll be immediately, but I have to work that out. When we finalize some things with d1 I see,
okay, Amy, yes, sir, yes. So
it's been a few weeks since I've been at the table, but obviously it's been a, you know, trying weeks for the department. And so I'm just wondering, if you can share you know, how the department is doing morale wise. I know there was the officer involved shooting to another police officer. You know you're leaving. I know there's one of your officers who's currently dealing with some medical issues. So just to get a sense on how the department is, thank
you for that, Commissioner Presley, I knew that conversation would come up. It has been a rough year. These past two weeks we have. We started off losing my old Scout car partner, Anthony Top just he died in his sleep, 51 year old man, and you know, complications from COVID damaging his heart. We moved from that to we know that we've got flow. Joe Sharon Johnson, who was in the struggle of her life from a car accident, and everyone knows and loves her. You top that with, really,
one of the most unbelievable set of circumstances I have ever seen in my career, in my life, really,
with a sergeant and Sergeant moss working at our special response team who was struggling mentally. No one knew. We found out some things recently that this struggle was long term. He was ongoing, and the communication just wasn't there to the police department.
He had some concerns with the police department that he expressed his last day, but they were not at a level that would brought about something like this. There was just some grievances that he had with some individuals that he worked with. And frankly, you know, he was in in trauma, he was he was certainly in crisis. And so there really was no true logic to what he was communicating. They were just just comments
that we're all looking into. By the way we are. We've opened up an investigation, but
nothing criminal, nothing ethical, nothing moral, just grievances with others. But we didn't see this coming, and there was no indicators, nothing. And unfortunately, two officers who will probably wear this not probably will wear this for the rest of their lives, had to engage another officer, a supervisor, in a fatal force situation where they had to use fatal force to take him down as a result that of him wanting to die by police officer.
He was very specific. The board will hear that when we produced the the investigation in the video, but
he was very vocal about his feelings towards being killed by a police officer. He was very specific as to which group he wanted that to be. I won't get into that right now. The officers were just put in a situation that you know they probably no one ever saw coming. They had to react. I feel awful for them, but they were absolute heroes. If you when you see what they encountered, you will, you will agree with me.
I'm very concerned about them, because they now have to go forward. You know, their trust has been violated. They're broken, obviously, and this is something that you just don't see coming, and then from a super supervisor. So we'll deal with that. We've we're getting them the help that they need, but there's probably some help they're going to need long term that they don't even know about right now because of the PTSD and all the things that come with what they had to deal with. The Department is reeling on top of all of that, last week, arguably one of the most popular commanders in the Detroit Police Department. And commander Decker, had a massive heart attack while attending a fundraiser, and he is also in the fight of his life.
He
He did not have a heart rate or heartbeat or pulse for many, many minutes. They worked on him for 15 minutes. Just unbelievable. Police officers, just unbelievable. Captain Duda, Captain petty, Sergeant, thank you. Sergeant Kimball, worked Decker for 15 minutes. So hard that dude was concerned that he broke his ribs. And we actually had a little chuckle about that, because he did but, but he's alive, and I actually talked to him Saturday. He's still in critical condition, and he's he's looking at surgery, open heart surgery in the next couple days. So a lot going on this. That's the Detroit Police Department, but yet, they're still showing up every single showing up every single day. Yet they're still responding to every police run, and they're doing it like they always do, with professionalism and distinction. And we should all be proud of this police department. I said that to you, Chairman in that meeting, you've got a good police department here, and they're showing up they haven't. They're not taking a bunch of sick days, and, you know, they're not airing their their frustration on this issue. They're just confused because no one, everyone's just kind of like what you know, we this, no one saw this coming. So we're making sure that the officers know that there are resources available. They're making. We're making sure that officers have, you know, counselors to talk to the Office of workplace and community resiliency. We're bringing everything that we can. They had a something we call chop it up Tuesdays the other day where the officers were able to, a lot of officers attended to were able to just come out and emote about what happened. But what was interesting, it wasn't just that incident that they talked about. They just talked about having a place to deposit those emotions from some of the things that they see. And I thought it was a very fruitful conversation. And in my new role, I'm going to make sure that I'm front and center on on getting those services over here, for the for the officers, because I think it's necessary, not just the community, but officers are part of the community, right? I mean, whether they they physically live in it or not. They're part of the community of Detroit because of the work that they do. So we're going to make sure that we got those resources over here so, but that's, that's, that's that report. It's a lot.
Thank you. And so to follow up, if I may, through the chair, you know, obviously, just immense pressures that the department is under. And you know, again, my prayers go out to all of the families who have been impacted the officers as well. But again, from the civilian oversight point of view, you know, obviously, when one is under that kind of emotional distress, there's a likelihood that, you know, demeanor might become more of an issue, maybe both more short in dealing with citizens because of all that they're dealing with. And so I just wonder if there are any kind of communications that has been happening so that officers are sensitive to the fact that you might be going through a lot, but you know, when you engage with citizens, whether it's a traffic stop or the light, there's still an expectation of how we do business. Absolutely,
we had our COMSAT meeting this morning, and then, as part of COMSAT, we have a risk assessment. So we don't just do crime, we don't just do case notes. We do the whole picture. And one of the components of that, that com stat is, how are the officers performing, interacting with citizens today? One of the reports that we got is 100% compliance and body camera. Now, you know, our compliance rate as as conveyed to us by the federal government is greater than 94% right? That's That was the bar. We raised that bar. It's now 100% because you need all incidents caught on body camera. And the department has performed for the past three months at 100% compliance and body cam usage. Give
him a hand. Give him a hand.
But we tested it, and we looked at those numbers, and that report is available to this board. We'll send it, in fact, if we can send it over, but that's internal testing, right? Yeah, the other thing that we looked at is citizens complaints, and right now we've got a 40% reduction over the same period of time last testing period, which was 30 days ago. So I don't want to misrepresent that. It's not over the year. It's over the every 30 days we test this and over the last 30 days, we've seen a significant reduction in citizen complaints. Now this testing period doesn't represent this incident. We will look at that again in the next couple of weeks to see if the department has changed as a result of it, but I give you that data set to illustrate that we are constantly aware of how we're performing with the community and the ACS, assistant chiefs, the deputy chiefs, they are constantly engaging the officers. The command teams are constantly engaging the officers to make sure not just that they're performing, but they're upright in that performance, that they're not suffering emotionally. These officers see things that people shouldn't see. You look at our homicide team, you know people, it's not like on television, you know it's not they don't. They don't get 15 minutes and get to go home and have laugh. They're at those scenes for hours and hours and hours, and they're investigating that body, and they're seeing this stuff over and over and over again, day in and day out. It takes its toll. There's a book out called the Body Keeps the Score, and it does. Your body knows what you're seeing. Your body reacts. Your emotions react to it. And so we make sure that the officers get what they need, but we don't do a good enough job. And what's evident is when you have officers that that are struggling, and so we're doing everything. We're going to do more, and we're very responsive when an officer comes up. We've had a few recently that came to us and said, I'm struggling, and you know, we don't broadcast that, but we get them the help that they need. We don't take money out their pocket to give them that help. We put them off sick, but we pay for it, and we're not going to fight them on if they say I'm still struggling, but they don't have the corresponding sick time. I'm going to make sure, and the department's going to make sure, and my successor is going to make sure that they have the support that they need.
Thank you. Yep, Commissioner Bernard and banks all right. Chief,
the sergeant who was killed, as you pointed out very graphically, unfortunately, I assume he will get his family will get his full pension, and he will be buried with honors like other I'm buried.
He will get the the by policy, the funeral that is prescribed for those who commit suicide. I didn't understand you. I'm sorry. So we have very specific policies as it relates to types of funerals, line of duty, not line of duty. Retired suicide, and he will get the one that corresponds with with his circumstance.
Well, it would be line of duty suicide, wouldn't it? It's no line of duty suicide,
it would not. There is none. There's no policy.
To me, he should, because of the references that you made to his mental health and what was happening with him. Clearly, he wasn't himself. So he was ill right at the time this occurred. And if he was ill at the time it occurred. It seems to me that he should get the full benefit of everything because of his what, 22 years of service?
Well, you know, Mr. Chair, I'm
sorry to interrupt, is there a boy this? This conversation might be better had through email or or the like, just out of specific to the
family. You know this, you know the opening public talk about it, that's
but it is your right to act, right to ask, we
just ask that you to consider the family, you know. And this is a public domain, you know. Well, I'm saying, you know, the sensitive nature of this, it's not the proper form. But you know, could you agree with us? No, I don't agree because I can't. I can't stifle what you have to say. That's what it is. Okay? I'm saying you are you done? I'm done. Okay, thank you. That's all we ask. Commissioner,
yes, through the chair chief white, there was a case some years ago, Mario Willis versus Detroit Police Department, and there was a detective in that case that committed misconduct, and Mr. Willis was sent to prison? Is there any kind of way where that case can be revisited, or I talk to someone from DDD or whatever? Because I'm advocating for the family. The family called me up and I'm advocating for the family. Is in the family wants some help. They want some answers. Is there anybody, a supervisor or something that family could talk to, or I can talk to, or we can get more clarity on this situation, some type of documentations on this here situation, if we could miss chief
through the Chair, if, if the conduct corresponds with with the conviction, obviously, there's a conviction integrity unit. If the conduct is independent and has no consequence, it'd be a little bit more challenging, but we can, we can work with you. If you could give the name to the Assistant Chief. He's going to be taking over for me, Assistant Chief Fitzgerald, and we can research the information, get back with you. It may be something that you direct to the prosecutor if you think that the conviction should be overturned, there's a process for that. If you think that the misconduct led to the conviction, there's a process for that as well.
Okay, thank you.
Who's taking over for you?
It'll be announced Friday.
Okay, yeah,
yeah. Any other questions, no other questions. We thank you, chief, and we keep you in our prayers.
Thank you very much.
Go to Oral Communications.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We have eight speakers. I'll call the first four at this time, the first speaker will be Minister Eric blunt, followed by Miss Bernie Smith, then Miss perdia Butler and Mr. Judante Smith.
Good afternoon board. I'm Minister Eric bar from Sacred Heart Catholic Church here in Detroit. I'm a lifelong Detroiter, good afternoon at least once a month, sometimes once a week. Some defense attorney, investigative reporter, or the inviction Conviction Integrity Unit reveals some mostly black men who have been wrongly convicted, finally gets released from prison. But I blame a lot of this on one of the most significant things I think chief White has done as his tenure as chief, and that was the 2022 union contract in it, it clearly states that an officers disciplinary history cannot be used in a determination for their promotion. That's a built in system to promote bad cops. So what do you expect? And this second most significant thing is his ridiculous 2045, day body cam release delay didn't do it for Hakeem Littleton that was released the same day and then the July, July 7 Block Party video. Even though it wasn't a police use of force, he still released it way sooner than the 45 days. No. So that's why the Coalition for police transparency and accountability is calling for city ordinance that releases body worn camera footage within seven days. Seven days is what we hope will be too short of a time for any video footage to be manipulated. No and you shouldn't be surprised why we say we're pushing for an ordinance. An ordinance is city law, and it supersedes everything else. The time wasted on policies on this board of police commissioners is just
a joke,
because their disciplinary history cannot be used even in their promotion. So your policies have no teeth at all. For the officer that wanted to kill himself by members of his own unit, you got to really think deep about what that really means, about what's going on in the in the Detroit Police Department. I
think that's your time. 55
seconds, brother, come on, man, no, you're right.
Please get the clock right. Well, we have it up here, you know, because he tricked Me. Next speaker, always great. So,
yes, ma'am, thank you.
Good afternoon to my police commissioners.
Good afternoon.
I've been gone a couple of weeks, but I've been keeping up with what's going on. You know, I don't have a problem with the Reverend coming here and being in attendance, but when you constantly come everywhere, address the chair. Please address the chair, the whole committee. Okay, when you every day, every week, and complain and complain about the police department who's out here giving their lives for all of us, but you don't have a solution. I don't mind him complaining, but why don't you have a solution? I know no minister in the pulpit that talks against the police department is that young man does, or that man or the minister, and it's sad. I am sick and tired of listening to it, and I'm sure you are, but you just don't say nothing. But anyway, we're going to bless him and pray for him, because no ministers that I know of that's in the city of Detroit talks against the police department like he does. In the meantime, I want each and every one of you to realize that your list, the police department itself, is risking their lives for us every day. I tell you that every time I come and you gotta appreciate what they're doing, at least tell them one day that we love you, you know one of these days, because I do that when I say it, and the fact that we have a commissioner that do not have no recognition of how important you are, but constantly be negative in regards to coming in here to vote, I just want you to realize there are other people in the city that's looking at us and wondering when we going to do better than what we're doing, but I think you're doing The best you can with what you got, but just continue to do the right thing. And I want all my police to know I love them, because I always tell them, when I see them, they're doing a hell of a good job. Risk time.
Thank you. Next
through the chair, Yeah, where's your amount of that? No,
I ain't bringing more power. I gotta start keeping it here. You may be heard.
Good afternoon. Wake up, sleeping giants. I call out to you to wake up, not a physical sleep, but to use your minds, you have the power to really make a difference in this city. Instead, you are not representing us. I have observed poor attendance. Commissioners burden and bail at different times walking out to keep from having a quorum, and Commissioner Willie burden sitting in the lobby instead of taking his seat at the table and even being argumentative with the chair, some of you come not dressed to take care of business, which disrespects your position as a commissioner and disrespects the people you represent. As I have stated before, there are too many officers living outside of the city. I know you will say that that's the law and that can be changed too. We have been gerrymandered redistrict and we don't have every fair representation. I believe if officers live in the city, they will be more helpful than maintain a clean and safe community. The mayor or any politician should not be living outside of the city district, state or any area they represent. The president cannot live in another country and represent the United States of America. Commissioners don't have a one issue. Thought or idea. Giants are powerful. You can think and do more than one thing at a time. Thank you.
Thank you very kindly. Next us. Next.
Good afternoon.
Good afternoon. I want to
say to you, Chair, I don't appreciate you telling me that I'm threat. I'm making threats to you and then trying to be buddy buddy when you see me on the community, be not like that. I also want to talk about Deputy Chief hope she's going to be getting a complaint from me. I gave her ample chance to apologize. She tried to drag my name through the mud at an event with a mother who has a murder grandson, and to and I work with mothers who have murdered children, and to say that I was disrespectful to that grandmother made no sense. The mother stopped me, and I have her number, make sure I bring her one of these Thursdays so she can come and speak about her experience with Marshall anyway, she can speak her experience with Marshall Bullock, who she was talking about. Marshall Bullock's has nothing to do with janante Smith and doesn't sound anything alike. I also want to say I'll be meeting with Turkey. We will be getting that meeting with Thurgood. I want to see him. And also, I'm just so happy to see the presiding chief leave. Also, I want to say that you you there was said that you don't have a lot of power on this board. The speaker before just said otherwise, you have so much power, and you are using that power unjustly. You are cutting other commissioners off. You're being very disrespectful. That's why I gave you the moniker officer because you're very disrespectful to a lot. I'm not gonna even name, but you know who you're very disrespectful to on this board, and you're an appointee. You were not vested interest by the people. You were not voted in. You were appointed by your buddy, right? So I want to say you need to clean it up. So this this board is made to address officer misconduct. I understand we have a lot of officers who have different things are dealing with. But my thing is, there's mental health issues going on, and we have a chief who's going to a mental health agency, and they're killing not only officers mental health issues, but civilians as well, who are going through crisis. We have a mental health unit who seem to not be responding. We have people like Charlie Butler who are going through mental health crisis, or whatever they may be going through. And we're getting regular officers, and they're either shooting to kill, letting other people shoot to kill or not maintain situations because some officers do a good job, but we're here to talk about the ones who don't do a good job. We're not saying all officers are bad. We're saying some officers are bad, and this is where we come and talk about it, not to glorify the people who we think are doing good.
Thank you. Next
we'll go with the next three speakers in the room, and then we'll go into zoom. The next speaker will be Miss Glenda magani, Miss Williams and Mr. Dana loon i
Good afternoon. Everybody maybe heard I want to say, I think Mr. Darrell woods on three or four occasions when I was telling Excuse me, excuse me. Thank you, young man.
Restart time. Please hold on, he started time. Thank you. Go ahead. On
three or four occasions, Mister Gerald Woods tried to assist me in so far as dealing with mental illness in my neighborhood. And then this past Sunday, I'm sure all of you heard on the news about the young the lady who killed her son and then killed herself. Those are relatives of mine. Mental illnesses is a real issue with many of us. And Mr. Darryl would point me to some police officers, and they were supposed to do a follow up call with me, and that never happened. That was on at least four occasions, you did your job, but they didn't do a follow up with me. One, let everybody know there's a hope not hand cut. Some of you already know about this. It's the 1833202, hope. 833200, hope. And the crisis intervention car will come out if you call 911, and tell them that it's a mental illness issue. This coming Tuesday, I will be going to court, along with my neighbor, dealing with this individual who's been in our neighborhood for a number of years and even assaulted someone, and this has been ongoing. So this is a real issue, and we need to make sure that we get the health department involved, as well as no numbers and other individuals along with prayer. Thank you.
Thank you. It will get officer to work with her. Yeah,
I'm glad to see the clock is up here through the Chair. Yes, I've been complaining about officers living in shelters. So I've come to realize a lot of people in this room, and I cannot say everyone in this room, but it's a lot of people sitting at these tables are fully aware of what's going on. I understand you guys cannot discriminate when you hire a person, but your birth certificate and your social security card is gonna tell you what you were when you were born. So if you decide to identify yourself as a woman, but you still a man and living in women's shelters. It's a problem, so HR, we gonna start there. So if you guys do your job correctly, investigate like you should investigate like you say on the back of this, the oversight of police officers and what your job is, and you guys should contact certain law enforcement agencies doing that. I've been complaining about this for a long time, but I did not know the severity of how many officers do live in these facilities. And taking advantage of this, the homeless structure is for homeless people, not for people that make 50 plus a year and can afford rent, and it's an overflow. They in regular people. Homeless people are sleeping in these facilities over seven weeks, sleeping in chairs while police officers are taking up space for homeless people. It's getting ready to get cold. This is not acceptable, so you guys need to get off your behind and do your job correctly and comply to the law, not calling in favors and continuing to cover up and acting like there's no officers that live in these facilities. It's been in there for quite a long time, and this is a high ranking people in there too, and I'm very upset and disappointed with the system where officers continue to conspire to cover up illegal activities, which is conspiracy. Have a great day.
Thank you. Next,
yes, sir.
My name is Mr. Dana Lund, one thing I want to complain about is every time I do come up here, and I do have came up here multiple times in the neighborhood of welcome Street on the east side, right here, the ninth precinct has never been straightened out. Officer Wade, officer kazinski and Officer gardener, those are in within the community relations officers. They never came around and took care any the business that I done called in about there's a young man at 19, 518, walk them that's running a junkyard business. And every time I done called in about it, they do nothing about it. He's just keep trash in the neighborhood. Why is it that you guys cannot straighten out that neighborhood? He has junk cars at 19 515, he has junk cars at 19 510, and he's parking them all in the neighborhood. He's downgrading my neighborhood that I didn't pay for two houses in that neighborhood. And then there's a lady at 19, 523,
excuse me. Excuse
time.
Please don't say addresses on on online.
I didn't mean to use profanity, but
Excuse me. Excuse me. I don't think you heard me correctly. Please do not use addresses. Are
empty houses, okay, all right. And that's where he has the junk cars at, okay,
all right, give him, Give me. Give him 20 more seconds.
And these are where, in addition to storm these junk cars sitting right there, and it's bringing my neighborhood down, I can't even sell my house, and that's bringing my property down. So what am I supposed to do? And every time I call this officer Wade, he comes out there, and he at a community meeting, he indicated that he was never called out there. Now, pilfer was the commissioner, and he said it right there in front of Officer pilfer, I hope I'm stating his name correctly, but what is it that they want to do? They're not going to do anything about it. And Number Nine has always been a precinct that doesn't do their
job. Okay? Thank you. We got officer to work with you talk. They're going to talk with you right there.
I wanted to give this to the committee.
Can you ask them to follow
up? Yeah, Mr. Here. We'll go.
Assistant Chief zero, can you make sure that the officer follow with the board as to what's the actions that's taken with this gentleman took all four addresses
down so we'll address it. We'll get taken care of. All
right, yeah, make sure we that's reported back to the board, yeah. All right,
Mr. Chair, we're going to go into zoom. We have four speakers in zoom, our first speaker will be election rule. Then we'll go to Mercury Maddox, Miss Tara Brown and former Commissioner William Davis.
You may be heard.
Well, actually the name is a election integrity rule it should have came across on a board. Can you hear me clearly now? You could, first off, I want to send a big, big, big shout out to the departing chief, James E white, stand up man, faced with a request, he made a tough call, considering what was requested and the death of Kenisha Coleman called it in Michigan State Police do a review investigation of his DPD case. Two, zero, dash, 11112, the death of Kenisha Coleman, not a suicide death. Now you yourself. Darrell woods, um, after the board voted to subpoena the report, the next morning, you went in and you told the Acting Secretary to not start the subpoena process. Instead, sent a letter over to the Michigan State Police, and they subsequently returned a redacted, redacted version of the report. And you yourself said that the Michigan State Police told you that it was a suicide as well as Assistant Chief Fitzgerald, he said that it was a suicide, and he was told it was a suicide too. Y'all both lying. And I say that because if there is a Michigan State Police officer that told y'all that it was a suicide, he lying. Now to you, Darrell woods, and I want to give a salute to the chief of Bill, stand up. I wouldn't be able to ascertain what it is I've ascertained. Now to you, Dale woods, the next time Mark McLeod calls you, take the call and tell them Ruben, rube with the waves, told you to smoke Dick publicly.
All right, check into that for us, Mr. Attorney, in terms of what type of violations that is, in terms of and, yeah,
next caller,
I'm
about
the illness, yes, In this
way we value those groups in
before It became a crisis that you
you able
To to the him away that I never dreamed that I would be
working with a worker. I never dreamed it,
but my disability was that I know how to deal with, not much illness by myself. But for those who may not know this, I heard family members with mental illness, so I know, so please take it seriously and
and God mercy, seek right
and those who are listening to
listening, thank you and bless you all.
Thank you. Next caller.
Good afternoon board. This is Tara Brown. I just wanted to say I understand that some people don't like the comments that are said here, but I do want to uplift the fact that, you know it is a good thing that Minister Brown is not out here just praising the police. This is an oversight board, and that's what's supposed to go on here. There's no platform for civilians to go on the news and talk about the experiences that they're having with the police. This is where they do it. The other thing I wanted to uplift is y'all gonna do a better job working on the way y'all treat each other. Up there, the world is watching, and y'all up there clowning and cutting each other off and yelling back and forth. It's just not a good look, and it's a lot of misogyny going on there. You know, I don't know if Commissioner Smith is quiet because she's just a quiet person. I don't know if she's quiet because she's being shut down. I don't know. I do know that Commissioner Bernard is very vocal. And you know this, she is one of the more vocal ones. And No, everyone doesn't always agree with what she says, but there's a lot of stuff that she's saying that needs to be heard, and a lot of things that she that people are agreeing with, and she's being shut down before she can even say them. And although I understand earlier in the conversation about the questions that she was asking, there are people that want to know. I particularly wasn't clear on how funerals were handled. So that was something I wanted to know. And this is a public forum. The same way y'all going to go on these emails and discuss that, anybody from the public that wants to hear it. Can send a FOIA request for that email to see what y'all talking about. As far as that funeral arrangement goes, I think sometimes you all forget that that process exists. Speaking of which, you know, Chief white, Congratulations on your promotion, and it's nice to see you going on to whatever it is that you want to do. However, I remember you saying that Sherman Butler's case, the reason we weren't getting the videos is because of Kim worthy. So whose fault is it that the foyers are not being responded to because I've sent over 20 of them and they've all been denied. Thank you.
Thank you.
Next caller.
Any other caller?
Thanks. I got one right quick. Mr. Chair, I want to say this, no disrespect or nothing to you. I want to let you know I love you, but you set the tone of this board. You the chairman. And you set the tone on how the day goes. You set the tone of everything. So I just want to let you know
that, can you say that? To say what?
I just want to let you know you set the tone. You the chairman? Yeah, absolutely. You know. You know what people calling in with comments like that, you set the tone.
What? And the tone is said that we're going to operate by the Robert rules of order and that we're going to respect people and right and everybody, every commissioner, is given due deference and has the ability to communicate and talk anytime they want to talk within the rules. And so if we go outside the Robert rules of order and disregard that, then we have chaos. I don't agree that for the most part, I think that this commission has tighten up his reigns. Been doing much better than previous years in terms of chaos. And so we have to learn to respect each other, operate in dignity and also operate within the rules. And so there's not one time any commissioner who wanted to say something didn't have opportunity to say it within the rules. And so we're going to continue to respect that. And then we're going to also make sure that we put proper and accurate information, as we have it out to the community, you know? And so because we cannot put out misinformation, we can't say someone was murdered and they wasn't murdered, or we don't have no evidence that they were murdered. You know, we can't do those type of things. We have to stay within the confines of the information that we have and within the Robert Rules of Order. You may be heard just
quickly. Young lady made reference to FOIA requests being denied. Chief Israel, can you give us a list, and I know that you have a vast legal department, can you give us a list of the FOIA requests that have, per sample, occurred this year, and what's been granted and what's been denied? Because they do that people file for your request in order to get to make information public or to get information and the facts, and if they're being denied in the way that she tended to suggest, I think we need to look into it, and I'd appreciate that maybe within two weeks. Is that okay? Yes, ma'am. Thank you so much.
All right, thank you, Commissioner and Commissioner yes
through the chair just in response to the previous caller. Commissioner Smith is pretty quiet sitting on this board, but I am watching everything I am based in this community, probably more than any commissioner that I see on this board, and not to diminish the value of anyone, I'm advocating for all of you. I also am one of the commissioners that was on the scene the day of Sherman Lee Butler, so I'm very aware of what's going on, and I'm waiting just like you all. I'm watching everything. I'm not argumentative, I'm not going back and forth with anyone, but please be sure I am paying attention and I am watching it all. Thank you.
Are you being held against your will or being someone put a muzzle on your mouth? Absolutely. Go ahead.
Go ahead.
Commissioner Yeah, through the chair again to respond to the last public commenter and to express any apologies necessary to Commissioner Bernard. My attempt was not to censure her or to prevent her from sharing what needed to be known. I was just a matter of sensitivity around the conversation, and it was not an attempt to keep the public from being aware of the different categories, just trying to get us to be thoughtful about whether or not it's the correct medium. So again, I do apologize that came off as misogynistic. It wasn't my intentions. It was only to again have us to consider whether or not this was the best setting for that type of question, noting the sensitivities we were dealing
with, and that would be clear that these two women and the three women that we have on the commissioner, they are very, very strong women who could, who stands up for themselves, are very, very vocal, and I have a lot a lot of love and affection for both of them, all three of them, she, she, she and I may not agree on everything, but We talk, laugh and talk and strategize a whole lot, you know, so, so there's no woman on this commission is going to be disrespected or disregarded in no shape, form or fashion, and they wouldn't allow it anyway. You know, she's a lawyer. She a lawyer, but that's any more public comments.
Last speaker is former Commissioner William Davis.
All right, good evening. Can I be heard Davis? Yes, sir. Okay, I
like to start off by saying that I was very pleased the last two political events I went to, one for Obama and one for the Vice President, and I'm also looking forward to continue police presence to make sure everything is nice and safe with people voting in various places that they are voting. Also, I would like to see more commissioners like yesterday, I went to an event that Commissioner Moore had over at Wendy's at Grand River and liver noise. I think more commissioners should be doing community events. I know our Commissioner Burton has been doing them for years, but I think more commissioners should be doing that. And you know, meeting one on one with the public, and, you know, just talking to exchanging the people know that y'all are approachable and y'all are listening. I think sometimes some people do not like coming down in the public safety for a number of reasons. Also, I think there's a greater need, a greater need, to make sure that people are aware that they have the opportunity to call in or to come down there and express concerns they have with the police department. You know, I wish chief White will, and I think, you know, perhaps he could also do a lot to help. There are some mental challenges with some, you know, the community at large and with the police department. Also, I agree with Miss Butler and that a greater effort should be made to try to encourage more Detroit police officers to live in the city. I think it's horrible, horrible, horrible that you know, over 75% of the police officers live outside the city, and over 90% of the command officers live outside the city. That makes Detroit look like it's an occupied city. Thank you.
Thank you very kindly. We did announce a report from the board secretary. We did that, right, yes,
all right.
Let's go to new business as a closed session. This is a we'll do that after this. This the new business is closed session pursuant to section eight. It's
an announcement about everyone's here, because after we go into closed session, people will be gone. Just an announcement. Go ahead quickly. I urge you to look at our website this week. Next week, the policy committee is meeting on Tuesday and on Thursday, we're going to make a report. We have about seven or eight policies that we're going to propose, that the Board approve, that this, that the port of police commissioners approved, and then we're sending them, and then they'll be sent, obviously, to the department. Number one, I want you to look at those but, but number two, there are a number of issues that are one of the things that has been brought to my attention by the young woman, Felicia. Please stand up so people will know who you are. She is the new policy manager for the board. She has done a spreadsheet I'm going to put that online too that tells you how many policies it is information for the public which policies have expired, which policies are currently effective. So you'll have a so you'll have whatever. It's called, I can't call it a windshield, but it's called a dashboard, I'm sorry, of what is current and what is not. And I urge you to engage with us and let us know what you think about the ones that are current, ones that are expired. We've got a lot, a lot a lot of work to do. More than 38 have expired, so I just want you to be aware of where we're going, so you and your families can familiarize yourself with police policies and procedures, so that when something happens with you or your family, you will know how to address it. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Commissioner Hernandez,
thank you. Through the Chair, I'll make a motion to move to closed session pursuant to section eight A of the Open Meeting act MCL, 15268, A, the department's request for the board to consider administrative leave without pay but with medical benefits for police officer Maury San Gary badge, 3511, assigned to the ninth precinct. Second
motion made by Commissioner Hernandez to go into closed session, second by Commissioner Bernard. All in favor, say, Aye. Any discussion, anyone opposed, the motion is carried. This is a four minute recess recording. Stop. There's
two
so spent one at a time. It was one at a time, okay, yep, One at a time. Yeah, thank You. I
