black lives matter

This summer, people in Chelsea joined those around the state and the country to protest against racism and police brutality, following the death of George Floyd at the hands of the Minneapolis Police Department. Some of those protestors were issued tickets by the Chelsea Police for impeding traffic.

Today, a District Court judge dismissed those tickets, saying they were issued under "an unconstitutional statute." This comes after a unanimous decision by Chelsea City Council last week to recommend that Chelsea Police Chief Ed Toth dismiss the tickets.

A judge has dealt a blow to the City of Detroit’s criminal prosecution of Black Lives Matter protesters. Judge Larry Williams, Jr. dismissed - without prejudice - cases against 28 people who were arrested during last summer’s anti-police brutality demonstrations.

John Royal is president of the National Lawyers Guild chapter in Detroit. He is defending those charged by the city. Royal says he’s asked judges to dismiss cases because city attorneys have withheld evidence.

Kalamazoo Public Safety Chief Karianne Thomas is resigning.

Her resignation comes after criticism of how the department has handled Black Lives Matter protests, including how officers responded to a Proud Boys rally on August 15 where members of the far-right hate group violently clashed with counter protesters.

The Michigan State Police says it is working to improve transparency, racial equity, and its relationship with the public, with three new actions.  

A federal judge late Friday temporarily barred Detroit police from using tear gas, rubber bullets, batons, shields, chokeholds or sound cannons against peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters after a group accused the city for excessive force.

Activists are taking the city of Detroit to court over the tactics used by the police department in breaking up Black Lives Matter protests in recent months.

The protests in Detroit started after the death of George Floyd. Floyd died while being restrained by several Minneapolis police officers during an arrest. 

The Detroit Lions canceled their practice Tuesday to protest police brutality, following the police shooting of Jacob Blake on Sunday.

Blake was shot in the back multiple times by officers in Kenosha, Wisconsin. He is now paralyzed.

Protesters say they will file a lawsuit against the Detroit Police Department over its response to a Saturday protest.

Organizer Tristan Taylor says the protest was against Detroit's acceptance of help from federal agents to crack down on gun crimes.  

More than 40 people were arrested when police moved in to clear them from an intersection where they had established their protest.

The City of Harper Woods has fired two police officers because they allegedly changed a police report connected with the death of a Black woman held in custody.

Priscilla Slater was detained in the early morning hours of June 9th in connection with reports of a shooting. She died in a holding cell that afternoon.

Federal law enforcement agents and other resources are headed to Detroit fight a surge in violent crime, U.S. government officials announced this week.

The plan, dubbed Operation Legend, is a Trump administration anti-crime initiative targeting several major cities.

The Lansing city council heard more than two hours of public comment during a meeting Monday night over a proposal to cut the city’s police budget in half over five years.

Councilmember Brandon Betz is joined by councilmember Kathie Dunbar in calling for diverting money cut from the police budget to social programs. They argue that would result in the prevention of crime. The proposal is backed by Black Lives Matter Lansing.

Several people spoke against the plan early in public comment, including Tim Brewbaker.

Monday, the Lansing city council may take a step toward considering slashing the city’s police department budget by 50%.

Councilman Brandon Betz says his proposal is about “re-envisioning public safety”.

New legislation (HB 5925) would prohibit law enforcement from using tear gas on crowds.

Following recent protests across the state and nation, some have questioned police tactics - particularly the deployment of tear gas.

A statue of a confederate soldier was the focus of a large protest Saturday in west Michigan.

The protest was largely peaceful, with a few heated exchanges between those for and against the confederate statue in the Allendale park.

Critics’ chants of “take it down” were countered by supporters chanting “U-S-A.”

The confederate figure stands back-to-back with a Union soldier. An enslaved child crouches between them clutching a scroll reading “Freedom to Slaves.”

Hundreds of people marched through the streets of Grand Rapids once again Friday, but this time it was to honor one of the city’s own.

Breonna Taylor was killed by police officers in Louisville, Kentucky in March, just a few months shy of her 27th birthday. Taylor was in her own room, in the middle of the night, when officers shot her while carrying out a “no knock” warrant looking for someone else.

Earlier this week, Louisville banned “no knock” warrants through legislation now known as “Breonna’s Law.”

Pinckney is a rural, small town about 20 miles northwest of Ann Arbor.

On Friday afternoon, several dozen people, of all ages, held signs and chanted “Black Lives Matter” and “No Justice, No Peace!” on Main Street. Haley Comella grew up in the village of about 3,000, made up almost entirely of white people.

Hundreds of people marched from the Lansing Center to the state Capitol on Wednesday as part of a march against police brutality.

The words "Black Lives Matter" echoed across the Capitol lawn at the NAACP’s “We are Done Dying” march.

Nathanael Jefferson has been to several protests in Detroit and Lansing. He says he has personally been profiled in Lansing and sees police profiling all the time.

Tuesday's rally to inform protesters about what happened in a meeting with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan got off to a rocky start.

Joanna Underwood, an activist who helped organize the first Detroit protest against police brutality, screamed at, ranted, and angrily lectured the protesters, along with two other activists she accused of "hijacking," the movement she was leading.

Underwood said Tristan Taylor and Nakia Wallace, who'd met with Duggan, were not legitimate leaders of the movement, because they were relatively new to the protest scene, while she'd been working for justice in the city for 15 years.  

More than one hundred protesters gathered on the state capitol steps Sunday marking a week of protests in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, a black Minneapolis man, by a white police officer.

A small group of mostly Arab-American organizers led a march of more than 200 people through the streets of Dearborn Sunday afternoon, in support of the Black Lives Matter rallies held across the country in the past week and a half. Calling for the formation of a citizen’s police oversight committee and other reforms, activist Nasreen Ezzeddine told the crowd, “The reality is, we do not need to look beyond Dearborn’s borders to find cases of police brutality and anti-blackness, left unaccountable.”

“Say his name...Milton Hall!”

This week, George Floyd’s name has been heard in cities across Michigan. But in Saginaw, marchers chanted a different name.  

Milton Hall was killed by six Saginaw police officers in a parking lot eight years ago. Combined, the officers fired 47 shots. 11 struck Hall.