Dana Nessel

Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Tuesday that corruption charges have been filed against Macomb County Prosecutor Eric Smith.

Three others – including a businessman and a former state legislator – also face charges linked to abusing public funds.

Concerns over coronavirus forced several top state officials to conduct a town hall promoting the 2020 U.S. Census in an empty auditorium in Flint Thursday.   

The public was barred from attending the event out of concern of potentially spreading the deadly COVID-19 virus.  The event was streamed on Facebook.

The state of Michigan is suing 17 defendants seeking damages for widespread PFAS contamination. The defendants include industrial giants 3M and DuPont. 

The lawsuit was filed in Washtenaw County Circuit Court on Tuesday.

PFAS are a family of industrial chemicals linked to serious human health issues, including cancer. PFAS have been used in many consumer products and in firefighting foam. 

State prosecutors are still not saying when to expect new criminal charges in the Flint water crisis probe.

Thursday evening, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel joined Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley in cutting a ribbon officially opening the department’s new office in Flint. The office will handle multiple jobs. But its highest profile mission is related to the investigation into Flint’s water crisis.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has gotten involved in the case of an undocumented Ann Arbor man who says he needs costly medications to stay alive after a kidney transplant.

Abraham Navarrete-Morales submitted his request for a deferral from deportation in December 2018. In recent months, his attorney Brad Thomson has been pressing U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services for a response, including going public with a plea for action last month.

The state Attorney General has recommendations for changes to bills on expunging criminal records. The bills are up for debate in the state Legislature.

At a Tuesday hearing in front of a House Judicial committee, Nessel said she is, overall, in support of expanding the state’s laws to set aside some crimes on a person’s criminal record.

But she had ideas that she said could improve the bills. One area of concern was a bill to automatically remove certain crimes from a person’s record after 10 years.

A former Catholic priest has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor after a Detroit-area jury said it was having trouble reaching a unanimous verdict in his sexual abuse trial.

The Michigan Attorney General's office says Patrick Casey pleaded guilty Tuesday to aggravated assault. He was accused of engaging in sex acts with a younger man who was struggling with his Catholic faith and homosexuality and had sought Casey's counsel in 2013.

The maximum penalty is a year in jail.  

A federal judge says St. Vincent Catholic Charities and other faith-based adoption agencies with state contracts can refuse to place children with same sex couples while a lawsuit is pending.

A federal judge ruled late Thursday against Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel.

Attorney General Dana Nessel and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson announced on Monday that they have filed six felony charges against Southfield City Clerk Sherikia Hawkins.

A special task force has come up with a new tool to combat elder abuse in Michigan.

It may only appear to be a simple form to be filled out by a police officer. But prosecutors and law enforcement officials say the standardized form, along with new online training, will help prosecute cases of physical abuse and financial exploitation of older Michiganders.

Legislation introduced in Lansing on Thursday would increase penalties on businesses that commit payroll fraud.

The sponsors claim the current system allows crooked companies to steal millions of dollars owed workers in wages and overtime pay.

State Representative Mari Manoogian (D-Birmingham) says these proposals are needed to protect businesses, not just workers.

“Bad actors that refuse to pay their workers full wages and overtime, and dodge taxes the rest of us pay, should not be allowed to undercut legitimate businesses and their employees,” says Manoogian.

Michigan is joining nearly two dozen other states and several cities suing the Trump Administration over its decision to relax rules on fossil fuels fueled power plants emissions.

Attorney General Dana Nessel has joined 20 other attorneys general from across the U.S. to ask a court to force the federal government to keep children safe in immigration detention centers. The brief says media reports detail “deplorable and inhumane conditions,” including being denied basic necessities like like clean water and soap.

The Michigan Supreme Court is unsure if it can weigh in on the method used to change Michigan’s minimum wage and earned sick time laws, and it wants Attorney General Dana Nessel to weigh in.

Attorney General Dana Nessel has joined a large operation launched on Tuesday by the Federal Trade Commission to put an end to illegal robocalling practices.

“Nothing is more annoying, more intrusive and unwelcomed than robocalls — and yet, Michigan residents fall victim to an avalanche of illegal calls each day,” Nessel said in a press release.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer has signed a spending bill worth more than $28 million. The money will be distributed to a variety of areas. That includes funding for implementing parts of the new Lead and Copper Rule for drinking water. The three million dollars for the Lead and Copper Rule will be used for things like water filters and drinking water investigations in homes.

After three years, the criminal probe into the Flint water crisis is back to square one.

The Flint Water Crisis prosecution team, working under the aegis of Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, has dismissed without prejudice all pending criminal cases brought by the former Office of Special Counsel.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has asked a federal court to accept her arguments supporting a group of Detroit parents who have sued the state. The families want the court to rule that their children have the right to good schools and an adequate education.

The families lost their challenge in a lower court and the case is now before the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Republican leadership in the state House and Senate has filed a challenge to a recent opinion by Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel.

The law in question makes it more difficult to put a measure on the state’s ballot. The law was enacted during a hectic lame duck session last year.

In May, Nessel issued a formal opinion that said that portions of the law were unconstitutional – in particular, a portion that limits the number of signatures a measure can have from a given geographic area.

Michigan’s Attorney General is asking three companies to turn over information about a major computer data breach.  

New York-based American Medical Collection Agency (AMCA) provides medical debt collection services to health providers and health plans.   

Published reports claim a police investigation into allegations of sexual abuse by priests turned up a file labelled "victim list" during a raid on Catholic church properties in Saginaw. 

MLive and the Saginaw News obtained the paperwork connected to a warrant executed in March of last year. 

Saginaw’s new Catholic bishop says he’s committed to “transparency and accountability” on matters concerning sexual abuse by priests.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced today 21 counts of criminal sexual conduct against five men following a clergy abuse investigation. Four of the men have been arrested, while one awaits extradition from India. 

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has joined a coalition of 42 state attorneys general who filed comments with the Federal Communications Commission to fight illegal robocalls and malicious caller ID spoofing. 

In the comment letter, the attorneys general called upon the FCC to adopt proposed rule changes that would allow the agency to more effectively fight caller ID spoofing activities and robocalls originating outside the U.S. 

Michigan’s attorney general is getting behind a push to change federal law to allow banks to do business with marijuana companies.

Even in states like Michigan, where marijuana is legal, marijuana remains a "cash" business.