CASES OF EXONEREE LARRY SMITH, LIFER GARY BRAYBOY PROCEED, CITE MISCONDUCT BY DPD’S MONICA CHILDS


DPD OFFICER MONICA CHILDS TESTIFIED IN LARRY SMITH, JR. DEPOSITION (watch in link below).

Under oath, ex-DPD detective says cops rewarded unreliable jailhouse informants (wxyz.com)

U.S. District Ct. Senior Judge David Lawson says multiple counts against DPD officer Monica Childs likely valid, Larry Smith civil suit can proceed

Lifer Gary Brayboy, who has spent 30 years in prison, still fights conviction, citing Childs’ coercion of chief prosecution witness against him, her record in cases of exonerees Larry Smith, Bernard Howard, Ramon Ward

By Diane Bukowski

January 1, 2024

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DETROIT — Detroit Police Detective Monica Childs (now retired) has been cited in multiple wrongful convictions in Wayne County, and to date has not faced criminal or civil penalties.

But on Dec. 19, U.S. District Court for the Eastern  Michigan Senior Judge David Lawson allowed multiple counts against her in a civil lawsuit brought by exoneree Larry Smith., Jr. to survive a motion for summary judgement brought by the defendants.

U.S, District Court Senior Judge David Lawson

Lawson dismissed claims against Wayne County and various other police officers and  prosecutors, but said the claims against Childs can proceed to trial. Smith told VOD that he is still pursuing action on the other claims in higher courts.

“There is abundant evidence in the record, which, if believed, easily shows that Childs fabricated critical incriminating evidence offered at trial against Smith and conspired with [AP Robert]Donaldson to do so,” Lawson wrote.

“Moreover, Edward Allen testified that Childs visited him while he was ‘in residence’ as an informant for the Detroit Police Department, and that defendants Childs and Donaldson solicited Allen to testify falsely that Smith had confessed his involvement in the Hayes murder.

“. . . .Allen further testified that Childs supplied the discovery package from Smith’s case so that he would be able to testify accurately about details of the case, despite the fact that he never had met Smith and did not know anything about the Hayes murder.”

Judge Lawson includes further testimony from Edward Allen which says the “Ring of Snitches,” at the behest of police officers and prosecutors, victimized multiple defendants, from the 1980’s through the 1990’s.

Gary Brayboy MDOC photo

See: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Larry-Smith_v_County_of_Wayne_et_al__miedce-21-12070__0123.0-Lawson-opinion-12-19-23-highlighted.pdf

Childs was also cited as a key player in the convictions of exonerees Bernard Howard (shown in photo at top) and Ramon Ward.

Meanwhile, Gary Brayboy, a Michigan lifer who has spent 30 years in prison, and says Childs coerced the chief witness to testify against him in 1992,  is waiting for a hearing in the Michigan Court of Appeals. Wayne Co. 3rd Circuit Judge Nicholas Hathaway denied his Motion for Relief from Judgment May 12.

“The Court finds that the articles and evidence of other exonerees do not relate directly to Mr. Brayboy’s case,” Hathaway said. “There is nothing to show that any wrongdoing by Ms. [Monica] Childs actually occurred here beyond mere speculation.”

See: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Judge-Nicholas-Hathaway-ruling-re-Gary-Brayboy-May-12-2023.pdf

VOD covered Brayboy’s case two years ago, when he had a hearing pending before Judge THOMAS Hathaway. See: LIFER GARY BRAYBOY, FRAMED BY DETROIT SQUAD 7 COPS INVOLVED IN EXONEREE CASES, IN COURT MON. JAN. 24 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

Judge Nicholas Hathaway changed his legal last name from Brobak to Hathaway when he married Judge Dana Hathaway. Judge Thomas Hathaway retired shortly after his groundbreaking rulings in the case of exoneree Thelonious Searcy, including the dismissal of all charges against Searcy with prejudice. He cited the prosecution’s repeated and blatant violations of Brady v. Maryland, in withholding exculpatory evidence.

Judge Nicholas [Brobak] Hathaway with wife Judge Dana Hathaway.

In his pleadings, Brayboy has cited the Smith, Howard and Ward cases as well as those of exonerees Justly Johnson and Kendrick Scott, and of Mark Craighead. In those cases, other DPD officers including Barbara Simon were key players.

In the Craighead case, the Court of Appeals agreed with the defendant that Simon’s role in other cases was legally germane to his case, and that it would have resulted in a different verdict.

“The trial court did not abuse its discretion when it held that the newly discovered evidence proffered by defendant was admissible as evidence of a scheme, plan, or system under MRE 404(b), a panel of Judges Cynthia Diane Stephens, David H. Sawyer, and
Deborah A. Servitto.

Mark Craighead/Photo Detroit Metro Times

“MRE 404(b)(1) provides as follows: Evidence of other crimes, wrongs, or acts is not admissible to prove the character of a person in order to show action in conformity therewith. It may, however, be admissible for other purposes, such as proof of motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, scheme, plan, or system in doing an act, knowledge, identity, or absence of mistake or accident when the same is material, whether such other crimes, wrongs, or acts are contemporaneous with, or prior or subsequent to the conduct at issue in the case.”

The Craighead court also found, The new evidence would make a different result probable on retrial. “[T]he evidence that must be taken into consideration when assessing a claim of newly discovered evidence is not simply the evidence presented at the original trial, but also the evidence that would be presented at a new trial.” People v Johnson, 502 Mich 541, 571; 918 NW2d 676 (2018) (citation omitted).”

Below is an excerpt of Edward Allen’s deposition in the case of Larry Smith.

WC Pros. Kym Worthy endorsed Judge Nicholas Hathaway (NH website).

In the deposition of Jonathan Hewitt-El, he repeatedly cites the role of Wayne 3rd Judicial Circuit Court Judge Kym Worthy (now Wayne Co. Prosecutor), as he tried to back out of testifying falsely as the only prosecution witness in a murder case.

He was supposed to falsely testify at trial, known to both the Prosecutor and his attorney, but changed his mind. He swears Judge Worthy tried to force him to reverse his decision not to.

From 1994 until January 2004, Worthy was a judge on the Wayne County Circuit Court.  In 2004, Worthy was appointed Wayne County Prosecutor by the judges of the Wayne Count County Circuit Court bench to replace now Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, who resigned to become the head of the Detroit Medical Center.

RELATED STORIES:

AS 31ST EXONERATION ANNOUNCED, WAYNE COUNTY, ASST. PROSECUTORS, DETROIT COPS FACE FEDERAL LAWSUITS | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

RAMON WARD, FAMILY CELEBRATE RELEASE AFTER 27 YRS. ON FALSE CONVICTION; WHEN WILL 100’S MORE BE FREED? | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

LARRY SMITH FREED, JOINING OTHERS FRAMED BY DETROIT POLICE, PROSECUTORS USING ‘RING OF SNITCHES’ | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

WRONGFULLY CONVICTED AND FREED AFTER 26 YRS, LARRY SMITH LISTS MANY MORE WHO SHOULD FOLLOW | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

‘RING OF SNITCHES’ VICTIMS: LACINO HAMILTON CLEARED, FREED AFTER 26 YRS; CONVICTIONS TOSSED ON 2 MORE | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

IN SPITE OF THE CONSEQUENCES: PRISON LETTERS ON EXONERATION, ABOLITION & FREEDOM/LACINO HAMILTON | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

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Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed regularly to pay quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

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DETROIT POLICE: ALLEGED ‘BOOTY BOYS’ RAPIST COP MICHAEL PARISH IS NOW JAMES WHITE’S CHIEF OF STAFF

DPD Cops Michael Parish and Michael Osman, known as the “Booty Boys,” allegedly subjected Black men to dozens of public anal cavity searches on the southwest side

Multiple victims documented their claims in testimony before Detroit City Council, civil lawsuits, media interviews; City of Detroit paid out over $700,000.00.

“These allegations are completely and utterly false, as supported by every member of the investigative process.” — DPD Dec. 22, 2023

“Because such acts flagrantly violate not only the Constitution, but also accepted law enforcement practices, these acts must figure prominently in personnel decisions about the careers of the officers who commit them.” (excerpt, full quote below) — ACLU Racial Justice Project Atty. Mark Fancher; the ACLU filed suit vs. ‘Booty Boys.’

Forced cavity searches have become rampant across the U.S., including recent incidents in Allen Park, Ferndale, Warren

By Diane Bukowski

December 24, 2023

VOD’s coverage of police and prisons rises above the mainstream media, which excuses abuses like those reported in this story. KEEP US GOING! Please DONATE TO VOD at: https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod  Cash App at (313) 825-6126

Michael Parish, one of two cops known as “The Booty Boys” on Detroit’s southwest side, for allegedly conducting public anal cavity searches on Black men in the 2000’s, has been identified by Detroit Police Chief James White as his  Chief of Staff, in addition to his role as Commander.

White and Parrish appeared together at a National Action Network forum Sept. 24, 2022 to tout the controversial ShotSpotter technology used by DPD.

White said he first met Parish about 14 years ago, and hired him to write policy for the Department.

“He’s been with me for many, many years now.” Chief White said. “Michael Parish is my chief of  staff. In his spare time, he has become a lawyer. I put him over the towing unit. He says, ‘Chief, we gotta hire some returning citizens. . . .Set the tone now.’ He brings in a young man  who went to jail for murder. . . as a tow truck driver. He became one of our best employees. But Mike wasn’t done. He says, ‘Now that I’m a lawyer, if you let me, I think we’ve got a lot of people that need fresh starts. I’m going to volunteer to do expungements every Wednesday.”

The complete Facebook video from the NAN forum is included below in this story.

The article excerpted in the box above was published 14 years ago in 2009 as part of a series in The Michigan Citizen, the same year White says he met and hired Parish.

Marcon Green and Melvin Aikins  filed suit against Osman and Parish, among 9 others

The article recounts allegations made by dozens of Black men on the southwest side. The men first spoke with Michigan Citizen photographer Wyoman Mitchell and this reporter, then testified at the Detroit City Council. Later, they spoke to and hired  multiple attorneys at a neighborhood rally, organized by Mitchell.

See full Michigan Citizen story at: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Cops-Rape-Blck-Men-Lawsuits-Seek-Millions-from-City-Michigan-Citizen-8-9-2009-3.pdf

Atty. Mark Fancher

In the case of Elvis Ware, the Michigan ACLU settled for $20,000 and an agreement that Detroit officers would be told to obtain a warrant for cavity searches and have them performed by medical personnel at a hospital, as Michigan state law requires. Attorney Mark Fancher was among the ACLU personnel handling the case. His comments for this story are included farther down.

“If I feel something that I believe to be a weapon and/or contraband within somebody’s pants, I will reach in and recover it,” Parish, unapologetic, said in a deposition in the case of Marcon Green. Osman denied having committed such searches in a media interview.

“Police officers Michael Parish and Michael Osman are both white and engaged in inappropriate conduct against African Americans because of their personal racial animus.” attorney Lawrence Radden said in a complaint for Terence Hopkins.

City Council members Alberta Tinsley-Talabi and Kwame Kenyatta listen as Byron Ogletree testifies about Booty Boys’ assault on him May 31, 2006.

But a barrage of media coverage  favoring of the police, citing out-of-court settlements through an internal procedure where the City paid over $700,000 in the cases of Byron Ogletree and Marjjo Clyburn, led to a jury vote nixing the Hopkins lawsuit.

It was Ogletree’s assault and arrest by Parish and Osman on May 31, 2006 which triggered a community uprising on S. Schaefer at Annabelle and brought the cops’ actions to public attention.

Ogletree and Marcon Green, Devon Windom, and Melvin Shields, Jr. testified in front of the Detroit City Council at Councilwoman JoAnn Watson’s request a few days later. This reporter broke the story in the Michigan Citizen after the hearing and separate interviews with the men.  Watson continued to press for action against the officers at subsequent council meetings.

Detroit City Councilwoman JoAnn Watson 2013.

“Was any discipline sanctioned by the police department, internal affairs division?” she asked. “Was any report filed by Ms. [Sheryl] Robinson [federal monitor] relative to the consent decree? This is not a small issue. It has grave impact on the moral and fiscal liability of the city.”

According to court records, DPD Internal Affairs Sgt. Joseph Tiseo, FBI agent Michael Fitzgerald, and Asst. U.S. Attorney Pamela Thompson jointly investigated the cases. Thompson eventually told lawyers for the plaintiffs that the U.S. Attorney had cleared the cops in 2007.

Detroit Police Chief Ella Bully-Cummings, through her spokesperson Deputy Chief James Tate, not only cleared the officers, but promoted Osman to sergeant. Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick ducked the issue, saying through his spokesman Matt Allen that the federal government had taken over the case. Tate later reported there was no basis for the allegations.

WC Pros. Kym Worthy used this photo in her re-election campaign/2022

In most of those cases, Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy filed criminal charges against the victims, based on allegations in the pre-textual stops (no turn signal, odor of marijuana, etc.), including charges against Ogletree which had him facing up to 37 years in prison.

The late WCCC Judge Carole Youngblood dismissed Ogletree’s criminal case after a police technician testified that he had not been contacted to preserve the videotape of Ogletree’s arrest, despite his attorney’s request to do so a day after the event. Officers at the Southwestern District had allowed the machine to rewind and tape over the event five days afterwards.

Three other WCCC judges, Deborah Thomas, Rudy Serra, and Cynthia Hathaway threw out charges against Melvin Shields, Marjjo Clyburn, and Mario Smith after testimony about actions by Parish and Osman. Prosecutor Worthy appealed in two of the cases.

DPD, ACLU respond to VOD requests for comment

VOD emailed the Detroit Police Department for their response to its Nov. 22, 2023 article on the matter, asking “1. How has Commander Parish been promoted to this level  after his “alleged”  forced body cavity searches (rapes) of Black men on the southwest side in and around 2006? 2. What is the Detroit Police Department’s current policy on such practices? 3. Does DPD DENY  Officers Michael Parish and Michael Osman committed such acts despite dozens of witnesses and lawsuits filed? 4. Did DPD conduct its own investigations of these matters?”

Recent DPD graduating class.

DPD Media Relations answered only #3 of the request. “These allegations are completely and utterly false, as supported by every member of the investigative process,” an anonymous representative said. “In addition to his years of service with the Detroit Police Dept., Commander Michael Parish is a licensed attorney who works in his free time to have the criminal records of defendants expunged. Many of these defendants are African Americans in the city of Detroit, and Commander Parish’s work enables them to gain employment and improve their lives.

DPD continued, “In his time with the Detroit Police Department, Commander Parish has passed promotional examinations and successfully served in supervisory capacities, allowing him to be selected by management and approved by the Board of Police Commissioners for further advancement in the Department. Commander Parish has served this city and Department diligently.”

Attorney Mark Fancher, of the Michigan ACLU’s Racial Justice project, was among the attorneys who spoke with men raising complaints against the “Booty Boys” at a “Picnic for Justice” event July 12, 2006.

He told VOD, “We offer no specific comment about Michael Parish, but we have a continuing concern about all law enforcement officers who engage in unauthorized searches of private areas of the body and any other acts that violate the constitutional rights and dignity of members of the community. Because such acts flagrantly violate not only the Constitution, but also accepted law enforcement practices, these acts must figure prominently in personnel decisions about the careers of the officers who commit them.”

Below is the complete Facebook Live video of the National Action Network forum featuring Chief James White and his chief of staff, Cdr. Michael Parish.

DETROIT POLICE DEPARTMENT CONTINUING POLICY–NONE

The DPD did not respond to VOD’s question about the current practice of its officers related to cavity searches, although the ACLU says it obtained “an agreement that Detroit officers would be told to obtain a warrant for cavity searches and have them performed by medical personnel at a hospital, as Michigan state law requires.” A search of DPD’s policies and procedures published on its website found no such language. Its Search and Seizure policy is below.

POLICE BODY CAVITY SEARCHES LOCALLY AND NATION-WIDE

Since the “Booty Boys” cases, police locally and nationally have continued assaulting men and women illegally with forced body cavity searches, with little accountability. Recent media coverage of such cases in Warren, Ferndale, and Allen Park is included below, followed by several cases nationally.

Apparently, such continued violations of individuals’ constitutional rights result from the failure of entities like the Detroit Police Dept. and the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office to hold officers accountable for what amounts to rape of Black men and women, in this case promoting DPD’s Michael Parish to “Chief of Staff” for Chief James White.

Warren police  graduation

WARREN POLICE

Excerpt Detroit News article: “The lawsuit accuses Warren Police Officers C. Wells, R. McNeil and L. Johnson, along with a “John Doe” officer, of excessive force and of violating the Fourth Amendment rights of Kirk Knopek during the March 13, 2022 incident. The lawsuit that seeks more than $75,000 claims Wells conducted the body cavity search while the other officers failed to intervene.”

“According to the lawsuit, an officer put on blue gloves and ordered Knopek to spread his legs and “just be quiet.” Knopek was further ordered to “assume a standing position to initiate an illegal roadside body cavity search,” the suit alleges.

“Wells proceeded to pull down and reach into (Knopek’s) sweatpants, pull down and reach into (his) underwear, reached in grabbing (his) buttocks, and then forcefully inserted his finger(s) into plaintiff’s anus,” the suit alleges.”

EXCERPT OF KIRK KNOPEK LAWSUIT FILED BY FIEGER AND FIEGER

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/macomb-county/2023/12/01/lawsuit-claims-warren-officer-subjected-motorist-to-illegal-roadside-body-cavity-search/71767717007/

FERNDALE POLICE

ALLEN PARK POLICE

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/06/michigan-lawsuit-officer-daniel-mack-illegal-body-cavity-search.html

Excerpts: “The ghastly chain of events in Campbell v. Mack were set off when Kevin Campbell, a black man, drove past Daniel Mack, a white police officer in Allen Park, Michigan.”

“Mack then pulled down Campbell’s pants and underwear, bent down, and examined Campbell’s genitals. Campbell repeatedly asked the officer to stop and told him, “Nah, you can’t do that, man,” but Mack responded, “Yes, I can, yes, I can,” and escalated the search. Mack allegedly felt underneath Campbell’s genitals, telling another officer he had drugs “tucked underneath his balls” or “tucked in his fucking ass crack.” Campbell claims that Mack also “grabbed” and “pulled” his testicles and “stuck his finger inside of my anus.” Eventually, the officer gave up and told Campbell: “You can keep it,” referring to these putative drugs. No narcotics were ever found.”

“But in an opinion by Judge Eric Clay, the 6th Circuit refused to grant Mack qualified immunity. It is clearly established, Clay wrote, that an officer “needs either probable cause or reasonable suspicion to conduct a traffic stop.” Mack had neither. It is also clearly established that an officer may not retaliate when a suspect contests “his or her allegedly unlawful treatment.” The First Amendment protects a suspect’s right to complain. Yet Mack did just that, allegedly tightening Campbell’s handcuffs and performing the body cavity search in an increasingly “aggressive, intimidating, and hostile manner” because Campbell protested. Under well-established 6th Circuit precedent, Mack’s actions, as recounted by Campbell, were obviously unlawful, so Mack must fight them at trial, and cannot hide behind qualified immunity.”  See http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Campbell-v-Mack-18-2156.pdf.

NATIONALLY

GEORGIA

TENNESSEE

THE HORROR OF POLICE SEXUAL ASSAULTS AND ABUSE OF BLACK MEN–FINAL CALL

https://new.finalcall.com/2022/12/13/the-horror-of-police-sexual-assaults-and-abuse-of-black-men/

In 2021, the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a District Court dismissal of Deaundra Billingsley’s complaint in the above case, and remanded it to the District Court to correct its errorsSee: 22a0365n-06.pdf (uscourts.gov)

TEXAS

MISSISSIPPI

RELATED: 

Previous VOD Article on Michael Parish:

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2023/11/22/dpd-cop-michael-parish-cited-in-booty-boys-2006-cavity-searches-is-now-detroit-police-commander/

Final Call article on Booty Boys:

Detroit cops sued for allegedly violating men (finalcall.com)

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Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed regularly to pay quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

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U.S. CORPORATE WORLD HEGEMONY BEHIND ISRAELI GENOCIDE IN GAZA: 20,000 DEAD, 1/2 MILLION STARVING

Aftermath of Israel bombing of Khan Younis in Gaza

Western Media Ignores Palestinian Fight for Freedom  and Israeli Killing to Continue Its Murderous Illegal Occupation & Colonization.

Global corporate capitalism led by the hegemonic state, the United States, is a fundamentally immoral and irrational system. In capitalism, both states and corporations are designed to maximize short-term power and profits for the super-wealthy corporate elite. [1]

The Israeli military has finally conceded that it had killed its own civilians on October 7 “in immense and complex quantity”.

By Jay Janson

December 22, 2023

VOD has added photos and graphics to this article from open-source media.

Please DONATE TO VOD at: https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod  Cash App at (313) 825-6126

Palestinian children after bombing of hospital.

For two and a half months, Israeli military forces, with the full backing of the US government, have dropped more than 40,000 tons of explosives—the equivalent of more than two nuclear bombs—on Gaza destroying residential buildings, hospitals, schools and refugee camps and deliberately targeting hundreds of medical workers, journalists, teachers and other civilians for assassination. [2]

At least 20,000 Palestinians have been killed and 54,000 wounded, the majority women and children. Many more face death in the coming weeks, as Israel lays siege in the south and deprives Gaza’s 2.2 million people of food, water and medical care. Hunger and disease are rapidly spreading through their makeshift shelters.

“Hundreds of people were killed — horrifically — in a massive strike at Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, including patients, healthcare workers and families that had been seeking refuge in and around the hospital.”

US vetoes have blocked international calls for a ceasefire. The US government is fully supporting Israel politically, financially and militarily.

U.S.-provided bunker busters

A recently leaked Pentagon document stated that US “security assistance” has been arriving in Israel on a near-daily basis. The US has delivered 36,000 rounds of 30mm artillery shells, 1,800 M141 Bunker-buster bombs and other munitions to Israel in late October alone, according to the document. [2]

Under the rubble, alongside the buried bodies of children, Palestinian rescue workers have found bomb fragments with the manufacturing codes of Boeing and other US defense companies. There is unchallengeable evidence that the Biden administration and both corporate-backed U.S. political parties are just as guilty as the Netanyahu government for perpetuating the greatest war crime of the 21st century.

UN Partition Plan 1947 awarded Jewish State 51% of land; Jews owned 6%, made up only 33% of population.

Why all this death and destruction? Because corporate war investors ruling the U.S. want to ensure that  its powerful Israeli military outpost in the midst of the oil rich nations of the Middle East continues to exist.

Something America established in 1946, when American power over an incipient United Nations of only 56 nations, produced the genocidal stratagem of torching the Holy Land with a phony, never expected nor intended to be implemented resolution for a crazy quilt partition of Palestine into six noncontiguous areas:

  • the Arab areas entirely noncontiguous;
  • the Jewish areas contiguous by a thread;
  • the designated major area for Jews containing more Arabs than Jews, meant to immediately provoke a civil war prepared for and expected by the Colonial Powers supported and well armed Revisionist Zionists leadership.
  • With the announcement of the UN vote for partition (adopted by a vote of only 25 in favor versus 32 against, abstaining or absent), the fully expected bloodshed had begun. The partition resolution awarded the proposed Jewish State 51% of the land even though Jews owned only 6% and made up only 33% of the population.

Western Media Never Questions Why U.S. Well-Armed Israel Could Not Just Defend Itself Instead of Claiming It Must Destroy Hamas and Murder Tens of Thousands of Women and Children. 

Palestine originally encompassed all the land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.

The destruction of Gaza’s homes and buildings makes the 2.3 million citizens of Israeli prison-enclosed Gaza homeless. Without  food, water, fuel electricity and sanitation infrastructure, the survivors will be forced to leave. (Neighboring Egypt and Jordan are well aware of the increasing threat of having to care for more than two million impoverished Gaza refugees seeking asylum.)

Once Gaza is obliterated and has become a desolate and de-populated land, while the Palestinian land on the West bank is further colonized by Israeli settlers, adding to the half million settler enclaves already making life difficult for Palestinians, Israel will be close to its goal of eventually having complete control and ownership of all the land that once was the British Mandate of Palestine. Then Israel could expel the Arabs from their last enclave in East Jerusalem. 

Rabbi at Israeli Military Training Base Says ‘Whole Country’ Is ‘Ours,’ Including Gaza and Lebanon – Israel News – Haaretz.com Haaretz, Israel News, Nov. 5, 2023

The Israel-Hezbollah conflict is intensifying! Could Netanyahu decide to settle old scores with Hezbollah and even Iran while U.S. aircraft carriers are committed to defend Israel?

Israel in its supporting CIA-overseen Western media[3] have concocted grotesque fables to present Palestinians as bloodthirsty savages in order to justify its horrific genocide in Gaza.

U.S. President Joe Biden gives Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu a “bear hug,” falsely depicted by Western media as a warning of restraint. If Biden wants to “restrain” Israel all he has to do is cut off billions in U.S. military aid.

Barely a day has passed since the 7 October attack by Hamas when the western media has not revisited those events, often to reveal what it claims are new details of astonishing atrocities carried out by the Palestinian group.

These disclosures have served to sustain public indignation in the West, and kept Palestinian solidarity activists on the back foot.

In turn, the outrage has smoothed Israel’s path as it has leveled vast swaths of Gaza; killed more than 20,000 Palestinians, most of them women and children; and denied the enclave’s population of 2.3 million access to food, water and fuel.

Critically, it has also made it far easier for western governments to throw their weight behind Israel – and arm it – even as Israeli leaders have repeatedly engaged in genocidal talk and carried out ethnic cleansing operations.

Many of the claims about 7 October have been shocking beyond belief, such as stories that Hamas beheaded 40 babies, baked another in an oven, carried out mass, systematic rapes, and cut a foetus from its mother’s womb.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken even described in graphic detail – and wholly falsely – a Hamas attack on an Israeli family: “The father’s eye gouged out in front of his kids. The mother’s breast cut off, the girl’s foot amputated, the boy’s fingers cut off before they were executed.”

As to Israel’s using the Israelis killed in the Hamas Oct 7th attack to justify the Israeli response of murdering at the time already 12, 500 Palestinian civilians, recent investigations find that a large fraction of the bodies recovered had been charred beyond all recognition, making it very difficult to distinguish between Israelis and Hamas attackers.

Since the Hamas fighters had only been carrying rifles, Kalashnikov rifles and other small arms, all those victims must have been killed by explosive tank shells and Hellfire missiles. Indeed, newly released video footage revealed that hundreds of Israeli cars had been incinerated by such munitions, suggesting that many or most of the Israelis killed fleeing the dance festival had probably died at the hands of trigger-happy Apache pilots, who reported that they had blasted anything that moved.

Israel admits Apache helicopters fired on their own civilians running from the Supernova music festival. 

“The pilots realized that there was tremendous difficulty in distinguishing within the occupied outposts and settlements who was a terrorist and who was a soldier or civilian… The rate of fire against the thousands of terrorists was tremendous at first, and only at a certain point did the pilots begin to slow down the attacks and carefully select the targets.”[4]

Last week the BBC and others led again with stories of systematic Hamas mass rapes on 7 October. Efforts by the United Nations to investigate these claims are being obstructed by Israel.

The media’s amplification of Israel’s version of 7 October continues to breathe life into the Israeli case that wrecking Gaza to eliminate Hamas is morally justified.

Media readiness to re-examine 7 October long after those events took place 

Only claims that support Israel’s narrative about what happened that day are being aired.

Unknown to most western audiences, there has been a steady trickle of evidence from Israeli sources over the past two months implicating Israel’s own military in at least some of the killings attributed to Hamas.

The Israeli military has finally conceded that it had killed its own civilians on October 7 “in immense and complex quantity”.

Regev told MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan: 

“There were actually bodies that were so badly burned we thought they were ours. In the end, apparently, they were Hamas terrorists.”

How did so many Hamas fighters end up burned – and in exactly the same locations as Israelis, meaning their remains could not be identified separately for many weeks?</

Shelled by Israel

Kibbutz Be-eri after attack Oct. 7/The TImes of Israel

Yasmin Porat, who fled the Nova festival and ended up hiding in Be’eri, was one of the few to survive that day. Her partner, Tal Katz, was killed.

She has repeatedly explained to the Israeli media what happened.

According to Porat’s account to Kan radio on 15 November, the Hamas fighters in Be’eri barricaded themselves into a house with a group of a dozen or so Israeli hostages – either planning to use them as human shields or as bargaining chips for an exit.

The Israeli military, however, was in no mood for bargaining. Porat escaped only because one of the Hamas fighters vacated the house early on, using her as a human shield, before giving himself up.

Porat describes Israeli soldiers engaging in a four-hour firefight with the Hamas gunmen, despite the presence of Israeli civilians. But not all of the hostages were killed in the crossfire. Israel ended the clash with an Israeli tank firing two shells into the house.

In Porat’s account, when she asked why this had been done, “they explained to me that it was to break the walls, in order to help purify the house”.

The only other survivor, Hadas Dagan, who was lying face down on the lawn in front of the house during the firefight, reported to Porat what happened after the two shells hit the house. Dagan saw both of their partners lying near her, killed by shrapnel from the explosions.

Survivor of Kibbutz Be’eri incident reveals harrowing details of Israeli forces’ assault

Survivor of Kibbutz Be-eri attack Hadas Dagan, with photo of husband killed by Israelis Oct. 7 in background.

Hadas Dagan, the only survivor of the Kibbutz Be’eri incident on 7 October, has broken her silence, recounting the horrific events. During the Israeli forces’ arrival, a fierce exchange of gunfire ensued, followed by missile strikes. Amidst this chaos, Dagan recalls the children’s desperate screams for help. Her testimony brings to light the targeted assault on civilians by the Israeli army, including her partner Adi, who was killed in the attack. Dagan vividly describes the terrifying moments,

A 12-year-old girl, Liel Hatsroni, who had been screaming inside the house throughout the firefight, also fell silent.

Hatsroni and her aunt, Ayalan, were both incinerated. It took weeks to identify their bodies.[5]

Confused pilots

Porat’s testimony is far from the only source showing that Israel is likely to have been responsible for a significant proportion of the civilian deaths that day – and for the burned bodies.

The security coordinator at Be’eri, Tuval Escapa, effectively confirmed Porat’s account to the Haaretz newspaper. He said: Commanders in the field made difficult decisions – including shelling houses on their occupants in order to eliminate the terrorists along with the hostages.”

Cars after Nova music festival bombing Oct. 7

The burnt-out cars at the Nova festival and their occupants appear to have suffered a similar fate. Worried that Hamas gunmen were fleeing the area with hostages in cars, it seems, helicopter pilots were told to open fire, incinerating the cars and all the occupants.

The Ynet news website cited an Israeli air force assessment of its two dozen attack helicopters in the skies above the Nova festival: “It was very difficult to distinguish between terrorists and [Israeli] soldiers or civilians.” Nonetheless, pilots were instructed “to shoot at everything they see in the area of the fence” with Gaza.

Pilots emptied the ‘belly of the helicopter’ in minutes, flew to re-arm and returned to the air, again and again.

Challenge to official story 

Palestinian children in Israeli jail./Photo: Human Rights Watch

Although they are rarely given a voice, Palestinians have their own, alternative narrative of what happened that day – and parts of it are being bolstered by accounts from Israeli sources.

In this telling, Hamas long trained for its breakout, and with a strategic aim in mind. The goal was to launch a commando-style assault on four military bases surrounding Gaza to kill or take hostage as many Israeli soldiers as possible, and a similar assault on local Israeli communities to seize civilian hostages.

The aim, according to this narrative, was to trade the hostages for Palestinian prisoners, thousands of whom are in Israeli jails, including women and children, often held without a military trial or even charges.

To the Palestinian public, these prisoners are no less hostages than the Israelis held in Gaza.[6]

Your 92 year old writer, is unable to stop thinking of the mass of fellow civilian human beings and their children being murdered, maimed and starved in Gaza with the weapons and munitions supplied by my government.

Seems like minded people, especially fellow Americans, should make this a topic of conversation among family, friends and co-workers, for none of us are safe from future crimes of our government. 

“Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence.” Leonardo da Vinci

“To ignore evil is to become an accomplice to it.” Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” Archbishop of South Africa Desmond Tutu

GLOBAL SOUTH

America will not be ruled by corporate investors in war dis-informing and shaming its citizens by U.S. genocidal military crimes in other peoples countries forever. The whole world is getting fed up with it. 

The vast majority of Humankind in the Global South cannot but be aware of having suffered genocide and military occupation by U.S./NATO similar to that being suffered by Palestinians today.

Ih our space age of instant world wide communication the five centuries of White race rule of planet Earth will come to an end.

There are more Chinese than the total population of U.S., Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Israel. There are also now more Indians than Chinese and more Africans than Indians. Imagine how this human majority feels about this continuing American hegemony.

End Notes

1. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/07/16/us-corporate-elite-killing-democracy-and-planet

2. World Socialist Web Site

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/12/21/cdxa-d21.html

3.Worldwide Propaganda Network Built by the C.I.A. – The New York Times (nytimes.com) December 26, 1977, New York Times

4.https://middleeastmonitor.com/20231030-report-7-october-testimonies-strikes-major-blow-to-israeli-narrative/… 4.

5. https://www.instagram.com/reel/C0tKA-stHb0/?utm_source=ig_embed&ig_rid=5d0d1e79-4f79-4d93-ab5a-803ed391531e

6. ‘Why is the media ignoring evidence of Israel’s own actions on 7 October?’ By Jonathan Cook  Israel-Palestine war: Why is the media ignoring evidence of Israel’s own actions on 7 October? | Middle East Eye

Jonathan Cook is the author of three books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and a winner of the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His website and blog can be found at http://www.jonathan-cook.net . Via Middle East Eye

Jay Janson is an archival research peoples historian activist, musician and writer; has lived and worked on all continents; articles on media published in China, Italy, UK, India and in the US by Dissident Voice, Global Research; Information Clearing House; Counter Currents and others; now resides in NYC; First effort was a series of articles on deadly cultural pollution endangering seven areas of life emanating from Western corporate owned commercial media published in Hong Kong’s Window Magazine 1993; Howard Zinn lent his name to various projects of his; Weekly column, South China Morning Post, 1986-87; reviews for Ta Kung Bao; article China Daily, 1989. Is coordinator of the Howard Zinn co-founded King Condemned US Wars International Awareness Campaign, and website historian of the Ramsey Clark co-founded Prosecute US Crimes Against Humanity Now Campaign, which contains a history of US crimes in 9 countries up to 2006  9 countries up to 2006

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Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed regularly to pay quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

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RUN-AWAY JUDGE? DARRELL EWING MOVES TO DISQUALIFY KIEFER COX, IN BLANKET DENIAL OF DEFENSE MOTIONS

Cox denied “substantive” defense motions, citing  2010 “run-away jury” verdict that led higher courts to  overturn Ewing/Searcy murder convictions

Ewing to Cox: ” Where is justice at, your honor? When are you going to switch your hat from prosecutor to judge?”

Ewing files motion to disqualify Cox,  citing: appearance of  impropriety, due process denials, actual bias/prejudice, MCR 2.003(e) re: previous employment with WCPO in last year

Cox was WCPO  Asst. Prosecutor from 2018-22, worked under APs Kam Towns, Jon Wojtala, architects of the 2010 Ewing/Searcy conviction in 2010.  Cox took bench Jan. 1, 2023.

Cox family dynasty, led by former Republican Mich. AG Mike Cox, who sponsored campaign at his offices, donated most campaign funds

“Undisclosed” Podcast series analyzed evidence in Ewing/Searcy case at https://undisclosed-podcast.com//episodes/state-v-darrell-ewing/ Episodes included in story.

Next: TRIAL BEGINS MARCH 25, 2024; Cox refused motion to separate defendants, but is holding separate hearings anyway; no opportunity for each defendant, atty. to hear other’s case

By Diane Bukowski

December 12, 2023

FAMILY, SUPPORTERS OF APPLE AND REEK: PLZ DONATE TO VOD https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod Cash App at (313) 825-6126 (any amount welcome, still raising funds for $46o.oo December web host fee, final deadline Dec. 19, 2023

#FreeDarrell,#FreeApple,#FreeReek,#FreeDemBoys,#mrbeattheodds

“Where is the justice, your honor? When are you going to switch your hat from prosecutor to Judge? How are you even sitting on my case?”  Ewing asked 3rd Circuit Court Judge Kiefer Cox during his pre-trial hearing Dec. 1. Cox had just issued a blanket denial of “substantive” defense motions, including those alleging pre-trial Brady v. Maryland 1963 violations (failure to disclose evidence).

“I just learned that you came out of the prosecutor’s office a couple of months ago and you are friends with Kym Worthy and Jon Wojtala,” Ewing said. “That’s actual bias!. . . Everything you said, your honor, was in line with something the prosecutor said.”

Ewing and his co-defendant Derrico Searcy are being re-tried after 3rd Circuit Court Judge Michael Hathaway and U.S. District Court Judge Denise Page-Hood overturned their convictions for the 2009 murder of J.B. Watson in rulings in 2017 and 2019. They cited rampant misconduct by a run-away jury that researched “gangs” and other matters on the Internet and Facebook.  AP’s Kam Towns and Jon Wojtala were the chief architects of the duo’s convictions, with their theory of the case alleging the Watson killing was part of a gang war.

Richard Phillips

Ewing said WCCC Judge Kevin Cox, Judge Kiefer Cox’s father, “had the balls” to exonerate Richard Phillips in 2018, after 45 years in prison, and asked Cox to follow suit. Phillips was the longest-serving exoneree in the U.S. at the time.

Kam Towns now works in Mich. AG office.

Cox also denied Ewing’s motions for Wade and Franks  evidentiary hearings, including one on the key testimony of Raymond and Jendayi Love, both white,  who identified Ewing and Searcy at trial as the killers. (Their testimony is analyzed by experts in Undisclosed Podcast #3 below.)

He denied a motion to produce the internal disciplinary records of Chief Investigative Officer Theophilus Williams and another officer involved in the case who had been sued for federal civil rights violations, saying those documents are privileged and “lawsuits are filed everyday.” Regarding Ewing’s allegations that trial AP Kam Towns had not turned over exculpatory documents in 2010, he repeatedly ruled that Towns said in a letter that it “would have been her practice” to turn them over, therefore she had turned them over.

Ewing’s supporters applaud and cheer Dec. 1, 2023.

Cox impugned Ewing’s credibility, claiming his motions contained falsehoods. Ewing challenged Cox’s rulings at length, and has since filed a motion to disqualify him with detailed, documented rebuttals.

At the close of the hearing, dozens of Ewing’s supporters in the courtroom applauded loudly as they filed out. Larry Smith, Jr, exonerated in 2021 of false murder charges for which he had spent 26 years in prison, told VOD he is now organizing support for Ewing among exonerees nationally.

Larry Smith, Jr. Dec. 1

“Darrell Ewing did a very great job,” Smith said. “Having himself in the courtroom, he considered that the evidence the prosecutor presented was clearly false. I’m very disappointed in the court making very poor rulings multiple rulings that Darrell dispelled, and he didn’t even take into reconsideration his actions. Judge (thumbs down). Darrell keep holding on.”

Ewing’s motion to disqualify Cox cites, “the appearance of impropriety, due process infringements, and actual bias/prejudice.”

He cites MCR 2.003(e) (a judge can be disqualified, if  “[he/she was partner of a party, atty. for a party, or member of a law firm representing the party within the preceding two years.”

In the motion. Ewing rebuts Cox’s claims in documented detail, including Cox’s denial that eyewitness Raymond Love said at trial that his first pick in a photo line-up was wrong, and that after he picked Ewing, the officer told him that was the right one. Ewing cites the trial transcripts showing Cox’ error.

http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Darrell-Ewing-motion-to-recuse-Judge-Cox.pdf

Judge Cox, with not even one year on the bench, cited the runaway jury’s verdict in denying Ewing’s motions, including one objecting to the prosecution’s suppression of information about the driver of the green Aurora which brought the real killer, Tyrone Washington to the scene, as Washington testified in a Mirandized confession given to the Michigan State Police in 2017.

“The jury obviously didn’t buy that defense or argument, in that they found a verdict of guilty,” Cox said.

Juror misconduct

He evidently ignored the detailed rulings made by WCCC Judge Michael Hathaway and U.S. District Court Judge Denise Page Hood, who each have decades of experience on the bench. Both excoriated the jury conduct in the 2010 trial, which included extraneous research they conducted on the Internet and Facebook about “gangs.”

“That’s textbook law,” VOD legal analyst Travis Herndon, who attended the hearing, said. “When a conviction has been overturned due to jury misconduct, then that jury finding as a whole is invalid. It has no force of law. When a judge during the pre-trial stages of a retrial, denies a motion based on the fact-findings of a run-away jury, it is clear the court lacks an understanding of the law.”

Multiple courts have held that a jury verdict that has been overturned by higher courts is no longer of effect.

“In Peterson, the Western District cited Sixth Circuit case law broadly holding that a “judgment that has been vacated, reversed, or set aside on appeal is thereby deprived of all conclusive effect, both as res judicata and as collateral estoppel.” Peterson v. Heymes, 277 F. Supp. 3d 913  https://casetext.com/case/peterson-v-heymes.

Driver’s side distortion

Testimony of Raymond Love

Judge Hathaway specifically said Love’s testimony was “virtually impossible to imagine.” (See Hathaway’s comments below, followed by one of four original podcasts on the case done by “Undisclosed” which exposes the  Love’s ID as undependable. “Undisclosed features a panel of experts in law, forensics. and other criminal justice areas.

The Ewing/Searcy jury based its guilty verdict on their illegal internet research on “gangs.” They discounted testimony that the actual killer, Tyree Washington, confessed to the murder. They even convinced the lone juror hold-out the day of the verdict that Washington was part of a “gang hierarchy” and sacrificed himself for Ewing. That was never testified to at trial, although AP Kam Towns’ theory of the case was that Watson’s murder was part of a gang feud. Washington denied this in his Mirandized confession to the Michigan State Police in 2017.

Eyewitnesses? Multiple Ewing family members testified at trial that he was at a memorial repast for his grandmother’s friend during the time of the J.B. Watson murder.

Darrell Ewing’s mother LaSonya Dodson Dec.1 

Such testimony from family members is frequently discounted as biased by police and prosecutors, with no specific findings of fact. In Michigan, however, its Supreme Court overturned this long-time practice in the case of  People v. Hammock, 946 N.W.2d 546 (Mich. 2020). Justice Megan Cavanagh, who wrote the ruling, countered conservative Justice Stephen Markman’s opinion that an affidavit by a witness  who was 12 at the time of the crime, and was incarcerated with the defendant years later was not believable.

“Justice MARKMAN expresses disbelief that Carter was selling marijuana at 2 a.m. when he was 13 years old, that Carter and defendant happened to be incarcerated together eight years later, and that Carter happened upon the Court of Appeals opinion affirming defendant’s conviction. In Justice MARKMAN’S view, this version of events “lacks an air of credibility ….” And yet, it is true that people in prison run into past acquaintances, that some people serving long prison sentences spend long hours in the law library falling down legal rabbit holes, and that some of those people were selling marijuana at 2 a.m. when they were 13 years old. These experiences are unlike my own, and though I cannot speak for him, they may also be unlike Justice MARKMAN ’s. ”


THE ORIGINS OF YOUNG JUDGE KIEFER JOSEPH COX, AGE 35

Judge Kiefer J. Cox was elected in November, 2022, after a campaign chiefly financed by himself and his family members. Campaign finance documents show that former Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, a Republican, hosted the campaign out of his law offices in Livonia, as well as sponsoring a fund-raiser there. He and his wife Laura Cox. a former GOP state chair, contributed a total of $14, 300 to the campaign. The family’s total was $56,475, out of overall contributions of $97, 000. Cox had only a write-in opponent who got one percent of the vote.

The Cox family agenda is questionable. Among other concerns, Mike Cox initiated a virulent campaign targeting so-called “deadbeat dads” in Michigan in 2003.

This reporter covered that campaign as a reporter for the Michigan Citizen, pointing out that it unfairly targeted poor men, and Black men in particular, who already comprise at least 53 percent of the state’s prison population as compared to 14 percent of the general population. Most child support payments go to the state to repay it if the custodial parent received support for the children from the “Family Independence Agency,” as it was called at the time.

“We’ve talked before on this show about the anti-father campaign going on in Michigan over the past year,” radio host Glenn Sacks said at the time.

“Attorney General Mike Cox is politically savvy and he’s found a good way to ride into a higher office—beat up on so-called deadbeat dads. Cox has had billboards boasting of jail time for fathers struggling with child support obligations all over Michigan and the legislature has upped the penalties for non-payment of support. Yet at the same time a recent Michigan Family Independence Agency study admits that “87 percent of all child support arrearages are owed by those earning less than $10,000 a year.”

CHANNEL 4 DETROIT COVERAGE DEC. 1

VOD VIDEOS OF JUDGE KIEFER COX’S RULINGS AT HEARING DEC. 1

RELATED DOCUMENTS AND STORIES:

Judge Denise Page Hood’s opinion on remand from 6th Circuit Court: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Opinion-on-remand-Ewing_v_Woods__miedce-15-10523__0016.0.pdf

U.S. District Court Judge Denise Page Hood’s order for new trial:  http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Darrell-Ewing-habeas-corpus-grant-1.pdf

Transcript of Judge Michael Hathaway’s order for a new trial: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Darrell-Ewing-Derrico-Searcy-Remmer-Hearing-Transcripts.pdf Excerpt below:

WCCC Judge Kevin Cox ruling: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Richard-Phillips-opinion_and_order_granting_motion_for_relief_from_judgment-2017.pdf

VOD WAS THERE DEC. 1 FOR DARRELL EWING HEARING; HELP KEEP US ON THE WEB–$460 FEE DUE DEC. 4 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

NEW: DPS COP SAW 2009 MURDER IN EWING, SEARCY CASE; JUDGE REMOVES DARRELL EWING’S CUFFS, DENIES BOND | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

WRONGLY CONVICTED DARRELL EWING, DERRICO SEARCY: JUSTICE SHACKLED, DELAYED 13 YRS. IN MDOC, WC JAIL | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

DID PROS. KYM WORTHY AND DPD SUPPRESS KILLER’S CONFESSION IN EWING/SEARCY CASE? HEARING DEC. 1 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

DID WAYNE CO. PROS. HIDE KILLER’S CONFESSION TO MSP IN EWING-SEARCY CASE, USE DPD TO STOP RETRIAL? | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

8 JUDGES SAID EWING, SEARCY DENIED ‘FAIR TRIAL’ IN 2010; KYM WORTHY: WE WILL PRESENT SAME CASE MAY 19, 2021 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2019/10/27/darrell-ewing-derrico-searcy-win-new-trial-in-murder-case-after-nearly-two-decades/

JUROR IN 2010 EWING/SEARCY MURDER TRIAL: VERDICT TAINTED BY JURY’S “GANG-RELATED” INTERNET RESEARCH | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2019/02/14/sixth-circuit-orders-evidentiary-hearing-instead-of-new-trial-in-darrell-ewings-2010-murder-conviction/ 

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2017/11/27/fed-judge-strikes-down-darrell-ewing-conviction-due-to-jury-discussion-of-gang-social-media  

DARRELL EWING, DERRICO SEARCY IN DETROIT COURT APRIL 13, NEW TRIAL ORDERED BY 8 STATE, U.S. JUDGES | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought 

APPEALS CT. UPHOLDS NEW TRIAL ORDER IN ‘GANG’ SOCIAL MEDIA CONVICTIONS OF DARRELL EWING, DERRICO SEARCY | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought 

MERRY XMAS! UP TO 800 WAYNE COUNTY JAIL DETAINEES FREEZING IN BITTER COLD, NO EXTRA BLANKETS, NO VISITS | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

WAYNE CO. JAIL DETAINEES SUE TOP COPS FOR DENYING SPEEDY TRIALS, OPEN COURTS, FAMILY VISITS, RECREATION | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

VIDEO VISITS TO INMATES AT WAYNE COUNTY JAILS SHUT DOWN, ACCESS TO FAMILIES, COURTS CURTAILED | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

FAMILIES MARCH FOR MEN HELD WITHOUT TRIAL UP TO 4 YEARS IN WAYNE CO. JAIL; DEMAND “OPEN THE COURTS” | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

UNLAWFUL, UNJUST! RALLY THURSDAY MAR. 17 TO FREE WRONGLY HELD PRISONERS; OPEN VISITS, COURTS, FILES | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought 

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Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed regularly to pay quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

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 Cash App at $MDianeBukowski (313) 825-6126

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VOD WAS THERE DEC. 1 FOR DARRELL EWING HEARING; HELP KEEP US ON THE WEB–$460 FEE DUE DEC. 4

Voice of Detroit’s editor Diane Bukowski and legal analyst Travis Herndon just returned from covering the case of Darrell Ewing and Derrico Searcy, wrongfully convicted in 2010. Above is the coverage Channel 4 posted Dec. 1, with reporter Rod Meloni. Bukowski can be seen videoing the proceedings. We will have a much more detailed and heavily researched story out in several days to follow up on the dozens of no-holds-barred stories we have posted over the last seven years on this case. (See our most recent story which includes links to many of those stories at FREE DARRELL EWING NOW! HEAR HIM SPEAK AT COURT HEARING FRI. DECEMBER 1 @ 1PM JUDGE KIEFER COX | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought.)

Please DONATE TO  VOD:  

https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod  

Cash App (313) 825-6126

Meanwhile, we urgently need help paying our quarterly web fee of $460.00 due this Monday, Dec. 4 to keep VOD alive and publishing. ANY AMOUNT IS HELPFUL AND WILL BE MUCH APPRECIATED. VOD is a pro bono newspaper established in 2010. We have posted over 2,000 news stories going back nearly 14 years now, covering a broad range of issues important not only to Detroiters, but people of color and poor people across the country and even the globe. Our stories, such as those on the Detroit bankruptcy 10 years ago, and the horrific Detroit police murder of Aiyana Jones, have great historical and research value and we need help keeping them on-line. Our staff lives on very limited incomes; many of them are incarcerated.

President Nelson Mandela, South Africa

Note our recent posts on the genocide Israel has unleashed against the people of the Palestinian State, during which over 15, 000 Palestinians, 70 percent of them women and children have been bombed to death in the Gaza Strip since October 7. Hundreds more Palestinians are being killed in the West Bank every day, while thousands more languish in Israeli prisons. Go to MUSLIM LEADERS FROM MICHIGAN AND ACROSS THE U.S. #ABANDONBIDEN AS GAZA DEATH TOLL PASSES 11,000 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought and FREE PALESTINE! CEASE FIRE NOW! MASSIVE RALLY IN WASHINGTON, D.C. NOT SEEN ON MAINSTREAM MEDIA | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought.

Our chief f0cus for the last several years has been narrowed to coverage of mass incarceration, including individual cases of wrongful convictions rampant in particular throughout Wayne County, and of crimes committed by police, including the cases of Detroiters killed by police since 1992. VOD editor Bukowski was known for her coverage of these cases first in the Michigan Citizen, and following up with the Voice of Detroit.

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URGENT: Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed NOW to pay our quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 by Dec. 4.  VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid. 

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

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 Cash App at $MDianeBukowski (313) 825-6126

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IN LOVING MEMORY OF CARL BRUNER, DETROIT MAN FREED IN 2020, ACQUITTED AT RE-TRIAL AFTER EXONERATION

By Bill Branham, Proving Innocence

Proving Innocence <newsletter@provinginnocence.org>

December 2, 2023
We are so sad to learn about the death of Carl Bruner, 39. He died of a heart attack on November 21st. He was found in his apartment unresponsive when his sister arrived to pick him up for the trip from Kentucky back to Detroit for Thanksgiving. Carl was released from prison three and a half years ago.

Carl Bruner, March 2020

Carl Bruner, March 2020

Carl had a difficult time adjusting to life outside prison. In addition to that, the police officer that he was suing for his wrongful conviction was suing him in response. The pressure on him was significant. It weighed on him. In one sense, Carl was never free from his wrongful conviction and imprisonment.

A lot of people were involved in getting him out of prison and supporting him afterward. He was a recipient of Proving Innocence’s Walking Free Fund. But sometimes all the support in the world can’t penetrate and heal the damage that has been done to one’s soul. We try. Many times we succeed. But not always. We grieve. And now we move on and help the next person. Carl is posted on our site at Carl Bruner. For those interested in his case, you may go to Carl Bruner II – National Registry of Exonerations (umich.edu),

The viewing will be held this Wednesday, Dec 6, 2023, at Stinson Funeral Home, 16540 Meyers Rd, Detroit, MI 48235 from 3 pm to 6 pm. The Funeral will be Thursday, Dec 7, 2023, at Triumph Church, 2760 E. Grand Blvd., Detroit, MI 48211, beginning at 1 p.m.

 The family is in need of $2,700 for the funeral expenses. If anyone would like to help, you may send funds to Carl’s mother, Vernell Vass through Zelle, ID 313-645-0959, or Cash App: $VernellVass.

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FREE DARRELL EWING NOW! HEAR HIM SPEAK AT COURT HEARING FRI. DECEMBER 1 @ 1PM JUDGE KIEFER COX

Urgent: Supporters of Davontae Sanford and Derrico Searcy: Please note that VOD’s quarterly web fee of $460 is due Dec. 4. VOD has published dozens of stories on this case since 2017. It will disappear from the web if this is not paid. Our funds are completely depleted at this point.

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By Diane Bukowski

November 26, 2023

(L to R) Darrell Ewing, Derrico Searcy nod to families at June 6 hearing.

DETROIT. MI —  Darrell Rashard Ewing, fondly known to many as APPLE, spent his 35th birthday in the Wayne Co. Jail, where he has been for nearly three years.

He will appear in the courtroom of Third CC Judge Kiefer Cox this Friday, Dec. 1, 2023 at 1 pm, as part of hearings leading up to a second trial, after his conviction and that of his co-defendant Derrico Searcy were overturned in 2019. Ewing is representing himself pro se. He will argue, among others, a key motion to Dismiss all Charges due to the prosecution’s failure to disclose key exculpatory evidence under Brady v. Maryland and its progeny rulings.

Ewing says the Brady violations began even before the 2010 trial that sent him to prison for life. He says AP Kam Towns deliberately engineered the convictions despite testimony from a witness at trial, provided by the federal government, that he had direct knowledge that Tyree Washington was the actual killer, and that neither Ewing nor Searcy were involved. With Towns and OIC Theophilus Williams sitting in front of him at trial, he reminded them that he had met with them twice to exonerate Ewing and Searcy.

At trial, Towns built a case around allegations the drive-by killing was gang-related, poisoning the jurors’ minds to the extent that several decided to conduct research about Black “gangs” on-line. They convinced other jurors that Washington was at at the bottom of a gang “hierarchy” and sacrificed himself to save Ewing. One juror, who had planned to vote “not guilty,” came forward at an evidentiary hearing in front of 3rd CC Judge Michael Hathaway, to expose the juror misconduct.

The hearing was called after U.S. District Court Judge Denise Page Hood overturned the pair’s convictions because of the misconduct. Judge Hathaway likewise granted a new trial in October, 2019, saying he had no choice due to the evident juror misconduct, and also noting that the evidence at trial was sparse.

So far, in the current set of hearings, both Ewing and Searcy have won motions to bar the witness Hathaway mentioned from testifying again. Ewing also won his motion to remove his handcuffs during court hearings because of his need to have his hands free to represent himself, and motions to have investigators and ID experts assigned to the defense at court cost, among others.

Davontae Sanford (l) and Kym Worthy.

The family, friends of supporters of Ewing and Searcy are calling on Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy to dismiss the case because there is no real evidence to take it to trial.

As in the case of exoneree Davontae Sanford, who she still does not concede is innocent, she remains an “Innocence Denier,” as she was called in Slate, a national magazine. When he was 14, Sanford was falsely charged with the murder of four adults in an alleged drug house, although her prosecutors should have known he was not guilty from day one. Detroit police who came to the scene in 2007 interviewed eyewitnesses who saw the killers and said they were taller and older than this child. Vincent Smothers confessed to the crime to DPD only two weeks after Sanford went to prison. He was finally exonerated and released in 2016.

Below, VOD Editor Diane Bukowski appeared on the Jay Love show Nov. 24 for 2 hours to bring awareness to the Ewing/Searcy case and upcoming hearing.

Previous stories:

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2023/10/23/new-dps-cop-saw-2009-murder-in-ewing-searcy-case-judge-removes-darrell-ewings-cuffs-denies-bond/

WRONGLY CONVICTED DARRELL EWING, DERRICO SEARCY: JUSTICE SHACKLED, DELAYED 13 YRS. IN MDOC, WC JAIL | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

DID PROS. KYM WORTHY AND DPD SUPPRESS KILLER’S CONFESSION IN EWING/SEARCY CASE? HEARING DEC. 1 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

DID WAYNE CO. PROS. HIDE KILLER’S CONFESSION TO MSP IN EWING-SEARCY CASE, USE DPD TO STOP RETRIAL? | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

8 JUDGES SAID EWING, SEARCY DENIED ‘FAIR TRIAL’ IN 2010; KYM WORTHY: WE WILL PRESENT SAME CASE MAY 19, 2021 | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2019/10/27/darrell-ewing-derrico-searcy-win-new-trial-in-murder-case-after-nearly-two-decades/

JUROR IN 2010 EWING/SEARCY MURDER TRIAL: VERDICT TAINTED BY JURY’S “GANG-RELATED” INTERNET RESEARCH | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2019/02/14/sixth-circuit-orders-evidentiary-hearing-instead-of-new-trial-in-darrell-ewings-2010-murder-conviction/ 

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2017/11/27/fed-judge-strikes-down-darrell-ewing-conviction-due-to-jury-discussion-of-gang-social-media  

DARRELL EWING, DERRICO SEARCY IN DETROIT COURT APRIL 13, NEW TRIAL ORDERED BY 8 STATE, U.S. JUDGES | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought 

APPEALS CT. UPHOLDS NEW TRIAL ORDER IN ‘GANG’ SOCIAL MEDIA CONVICTIONS OF DARRELL EWING, DERRICO SEARCY | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought 

MERRY XMAS! UP TO 800 WAYNE COUNTY JAIL DETAINEES FREEZING IN BITTER COLD, NO EXTRA BLANKETS, NO VISITS | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

WAYNE CO. JAIL DETAINEES SUE TOP COPS FOR DENYING SPEEDY TRIALS, OPEN COURTS, FAMILY VISITS, RECREATION | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

VIDEO VISITS TO INMATES AT WAYNE COUNTY JAILS SHUT DOWN, ACCESS TO FAMILIES, COURTS CURTAILED | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

FAMILIES MARCH FOR MEN HELD WITHOUT TRIAL UP TO 4 YEARS IN WAYNE CO. JAIL; DEMAND “OPEN THE COURTS” | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

UNLAWFUL, UNJUST! RALLY THURSDAY MAR. 17 TO FREE WRONGLY HELD PRISONERS; OPEN VISITS, COURTS, FILES | VOICE OF DETROIT: The city’s independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought 

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URGENT: Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed NOW to pay our quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 by Dec. 4.  VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid. 

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

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 Cash App at $MDianeBukowski (313) 825-6126

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DPD COP MICHAEL PARISH, CITED IN ‘BOOTY BOYS’ 2006 CAVITY SEARCHES, IS NOW DETROIT POLICE COMMANDER


The video above originates from Aurora, Illinois, 11 months ago, on the Indisputable TYT YouTube channel. The Illinois state law making such searches illegal is essentially the same as that in Michigan. Since Detroit cops Michael Parish and Michael Osman got away with no charges for conducting cavity searches on Detroit’s southwest side in and around 2006, such searches have become rampant across the U.S.

By Diane Bukowski

November 22, 2023

Please DONATE TO VOD at: https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod

“Booty Boy” cops Michael Parish and Michael Osman were never disciplined, but instead promoted. Parish is now a DPD Commander, Osman was earlier promoted to Sgt. 

Alleged “Booty Boys” cop Michael Parish, cited in 2009 in multiple lawsuits with the rape of men during body cavity searches on Detroit’s southwest side, after extensive publicity, is now a Detroit Police Commander. His name surfaced in an article in the Detroit News citing Parish as well as City of Detroit correspondence. This follows the DPD’s “pattern and practice” through the decades of promoting instead of disciplining and firing criminal cops. See DN article at Detroit Police to release first video of shooting under new policy (detroitnews.com).

RAPE BY COP IS OK IF VICTIMS OWE CHILD SUPPORT PAYMENTS?

Plaintiffs in the cases against Michael Parish and Michael Osman were never charged by Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy, and only minimally prevailed in their lawsuits, after a blitz in the mainstream media. Court records in the case filed by Plaintiffs Marcon Green and Harold McKinney (USDC 09-CV-11589, 3rd CC 09-11730 CZ) indicate that the final $50,000 settlement with Atty. Gerald Posner’s firm had been whittled down because the City offset the original amount with outstanding child support and other legal charges imputed to the plaintiffs.

DPD Captain Michael Parish from earlier DPD Report under Chief James Craig; Parish is now DPD Commander

VOD editor Diane Bukowski extensively covered the “Booty Boys” cases in multiple stories published in the now-defunct Michigan Citizen, which some media including Fox 2 News Detroit expanded on.

The story below was originally published in VOD on July 11, 2011, a year after Bukowski was fired from the Michigan Citizen and began publication of VOD. The Michigan Citizen folded in 2014 and is no longer available on-line, but Bukowski used her previous photos and other information from the MC stories in the 2011 story below. Also surviving is Bukowski’s story in the Final Call at http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Booty-Boys-Detroit-Cops-Sued-for-Allegedly-Violating-Men-Final-Call-DB.pd

From Original VOD article published in 2011.

Detroit City Council Members at this 2011 session included the
“Fatal Five” who sold the City of Detroit into bankruptcy with a Consent Agreement under Gov. Rick Snyder’s “Emergency Manager” Act in 2012.

The City Council voted to hold a closed session Thurs. July 21, 2011, to discuss the following:

“RE:  For the purpose of consulting with attorneys from the City of Detroit Law Department and City Council’s Research and Analysis Division to discuss pending litigation relative to Devon Windom v City of Detroit, Michael Parish and Michael Osman (Case No. 2:09-cv-11625); Marcon Green and Harold McKinney v City of Detroit, Michael Osman, and Michael Parish (Case No. USDC 09-CV-11589 and 3rd Circuit Court 09-11730 CZ); Quentin J. Curry v City of Detroit, Michael Osman, and Michael Parish (Case No. 2:09-cv-10109) and Melvin Akins v City of Detroit, Michael Osman and Michael Parish (Case No. 2:09-cv-1013).   (Law Department and City Council Research and Analysis Division).”

This means not only has the pay-out in the case discussed below been delayed, but the pay-outs in the other cases cited above have also been delayed. It is outrageous that this is happening–Osman and Parish should be in prison for life for rape, and now their victims can’t even get some chump change from the city in compensation for what they endured?

By Diane Bukowski 

July 17, 2011 

Marcon Green and Melvin Atkins; both men filed suit against Osman and Parish for sexual assault

DETROIT – A federal judge has ordered the entire Detroit City Council to appear before him July 26 in Port Huron to “show cause” why he should not sanction them. Since March 31, he says they have failed to approve or disapprove a lawsuit settlement involving two Detroit police officers who were accused in 2006 by numerous men of rape—public anal cavity searches.

Since the order was issued, the Council has set a discussion for Tues. July 19 on “legal representation in lawsuit of Marcon Green and Harold McKinney vs. City of Detroit . . . . Sgt. Michael Osman and P.O. Michael Parish.” The officers’ badge numbers are, respectively, 4788 and 4431.

U.S. District Judge Lawrence Zatkoff 

The two officers were commonly known on Detroit’s southwest side by the derogatory term “the Booty Boys.” This is one of the most of the egregious cases alleged against them, their search of Green and McKinney in front of McKinney’s 15-year-old daughter in May, 2006.

“City Council’s deliberate indifference has had, and will continue to have, a significant detrimental effect on: (a) the economy and efficiency of the judicial system, generally, and this Court, specifically, (b) the rights and interests of the Plaintiffs to this action, (c) the rights and interests of Defendants Osman and Parish, (d) the rights and interests of the residents of the City of Detroit, and (e) the rights and interests of the many non-residents of the City of Detroit who pay taxes to the City of Detroit,” U.S. District Court Judge Lawrence Zatkoff said in his order, dated June 29. (Click on Marcon Green Notice to Appear and show cause to City Council  to read entire order.)

The suit, filed by attorney Gerald Posner, accuses Osman and Parish of engaging in a “pattern and practice of improper, illegal and unconstitutional conduct.”

Posner said, “Each instance has involved one or more of the following acts: stopping, detaining, and searching persons without search warrants, probable cause or even reasonable suspicion, or consent; strip searches; disrobing persons, to a greater or lesser extent; body cavity searches; and searches in which the defendant, either bare handed or with a glove, has touched a person’s buttocks, and/or gluteal cleft, and/or spread the buttocks, and/or inserted a finger in the person’s anus, and/or has touched, grabbed, and/or fondled a person’s genitals and/or genital area.”

The suit (click on Booty Boys Marcon Green and Harold McKinney to read entire complaint) cites at least 16 civilian witnesses in the case, as well as 17 others who have alleged similar acts by the officers and in some cases have filed suit. The witness list includes this author, who with Wyoman Mitchell broke the story of the officers’ acts and interviewed numerous witnesses, in multiple articles published in the Michigan Citizen. It also includes other reporters from Channels 2 and 4.

Marcon Green was among four men who testified at City Council in June of 2006 about the alleged assault. He told the council he filed a complaint the same day with the Chief Investigator’s Office of the Detroit Police Department regarding the assault. (Click on Marcon Green citizen complaint to read actual complaint.)

“Michael Osman and Michael Parish pulled me over because they claimed my passenger didn’t have a seat belt on,” Green told the council. “They took him out of the car, along with his 15-year-old daughter. They made her put her hands on the car and then started feeling all on the back of my behind. They did they same to my friend, right in front of his daughter.”

Green, who worked as a dry wall contractor in a small business, Jack of Trades, told this reporter at the time,  “I was sexually molested, fondled in between my buttocks, and they handled my genitals several times, over and over again. Then they threw me in the back seat until they ran my name and let me go.”

City Council members Alberta Tinsley-Talabi and Kwame Kenyatta listen as Byron Ogletree testifies about Booty Boys’ assault on him/Photo Diane Bukowski 5/31/2006

The suit says the incident happened May 19, 2006 near Annabelle and Schaefer on Detroit’s southwest side. Many of the alleged incidents happened on S. Schaefer, including an assault on Byron Ogletree on May 31, 2006. He joined Green, Melvin Shields, and Devon Windom in testifying at City Council.

Posner alleges that the “red-headed officer” (Osman) searched Green, who had been driving and fully details the assault.

“He pulled plaintiff’s pants and underwear away from his body, put his hands down the back of the pants and underwear, spread the plaintiff’s buttock cheeks and examined the area, inserted a finger into plaintiff’s anus, and then turned the plaintiff around, put his hand on plaintiff ‘s front side, rubbed his hand up and down over plaintiff’s genitals a number of times, and then grabbed, squeezed, and fondled plaintiff’s testicles a number of times.”

The suit alleges Osman performed these acts without a glove, as did his partner Parish with regard to McKinney.

It says Osman “conducted both a strip search and a body cavity search of plaintiff McKinney, pulled plaintiff’s pants and underwear away from his body, put his hand down the back and spread the plaintiff’s buttock cheeks and examined the area, repeatedly rubbing the area between his buttocks and around his anus, and then turned the plaintiff around, put his hand on plaintiff ‘s front side, lifting, grabbing and fondling plaintiff’s scrotum and penis.”

The suit says when Green accused Osman of “acting like a homosexual,” the officers threatened to arrest him for being drunk. He demanded a breathalyzer test, which the officers refused to perform, according to the suit. They finally released the three without charges, but made McKinney, who did not have a license, drive.

Both Osman and Parish denied all allegations in depositions given under oath during multiple lawsuit proceedings.

Posner says the City of Detroit is included as a defendant in the suit essentially because the officers’ actions were commonly known both in the community and by their superiors, and the Police Department and City of Detroit took no action to prevent the assaults.

Former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick took no action on behalf of Black men raped by white cops

Then Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick would not comment to this reporter through his spokesman Matt Allen.

“The Mayor is aware of the allegations regarding these officers, and he understands the gravity of their alleged conduct. He also understands that there is a joint investigation between the Detroit Police Department and the FBI currently ongoing. Pending conclusion of the investigation, he is withholding comment at this time,” Allen said.

The FBI never took any action against Osman and Parish, and in some cases used statements given to them by alleged victims against them during criminal court proceedings against the victims.

After the City Council testimony, dozens of other men came forward, some at a neighborhood rally July 12, 2006, held outside the Bryant Brothers Auto Collision Shop. The Bryants told this reporter they had witnessed numerous such assaults by Osman and Parish outside their shop. During the picnic-rally, attorneys including those from the law firm of Posner and Posner and from the American Civil Liberties Union appeared to assist the alleged victims.

Attorney Daniel Reid and Byron Ogletree after charges against Ogletree were dismissed

It was the incident with Ogletree, who was stopped on Schaefer by Osman and Parish on May 31, 2006, which ignited the fuse, nearly causing a neighborhood rebellion. Community members told this reporter at the time that anger was simmering to the extent that some were considering taking physical action against the Booty Boys.

According to witnesses, during the Ogletree stop, dozens in the neighborhood came out chanting, “Rodney King,” and “Starsky and Hutch” (as officers Larry Nevers and Walter Budzyn, who beat Malice Green to death in 1992, were known.)

The city’s Law Department settled Ogletree’s case and that of Marjjo Clyburn for a traffic stop in which Clyburn drove away after the officers smashed his window in, for approximately $350,000 each out of court, creating a negative outcry in some media outlets. Both were represented by attorney Daniel Reid. Osman and Parish filed charges against both men, but judges in their cases dismissed the charges.

Charges against Ogletree, which carried up to 37 years in prison, were dismissed at trial by Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Carole Youngbloode after a police technician testified that neither the officers nor their superiors contacted him to download the police car videotape of the event after an in-station transfer failed. Reid called police the day after the Ogletree incident to demand preservation of the tape.

Gerald PosnerEric Frey

Suits by Windom, Quentin Curry, and Melvin Akins were settled by Posner and Posner in front of U.S. District Court Judge Sean Cox for unknown amounts on May 3, 2011, according to federal court records, but not before Windom petitioned the court for a protective order against Detroit police. Along with Gerald Posner, attorney Eric Frey worked on the Green and McKinney case, and Zachary Posner worked on others. A Posner suit on behalf of Prince Jeter and Ronald Kinney, Jr. was not settled before Cox, but has been reassigned to U.S. District Court Judge Victoria Roberts and is still ongoing.

Eric Frey

A suit by Marcus Wrack, represented by Kenneth Finegood, was settled for an unknown amount in 2008 in front of U.S. District Court Judge Robert Cleland. Wrack alleged that he was stopped and sexually assaulted on two separate occasions by Osman and Parish. A suit by Terence Alan Hopkins was tried in Wayne County Circuit Court. A jury found on behalf of Osman and Parish after negative media coverage of the Ogletree and Clyburn settlements, particularly in the Detroit Free Press.

Jones

In his order, Zatkoff explained his reason for the show cause order against the City Council, indicating that a settlement was reached only after lengthy negotiations.

“On two occasions since March 31, 2011 (specifically, May 4, 2011 and June 7, 2011), the Court emailed Mr. Posner and Mr. Schapka [representing the City] to inquire about the status of the settlement, specifically, whether City Council had approved (or rejected) the proposed settlement. On both occasions, the Court was informed that the settlement is being held up by members of City Council or, more specifically, members of the Internal Operations Sub-Committee, a three-member subsection of City Council, because of concerns regarding indemnification related to Defendant Michael Osman and Defendant Michael Parish.

Tate

Councilwoman Brenda Jones chairs the Internal Operations committee. Councilmen Andre Spivey, James Tate, and Council President Charles Pugh (ex-officio) are members.

“The Court also has been advised that these delays have “become a common problem with [City of Detroit] police department cases[.]” Zatkoff said. “At no time has anyone even provided the Court with a date by or upon which City Council will begin to consider (let alone approve or reject) the settlement agreed to by Plaintiffs, counsel for Plaintiffs, the individual Defendants and counsel for Defendants.”

Spivey

He ordered all (emphasis his) members of the Council to appear on July 26, 2011, at the Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse, 526 Water Street, Port Huron, Michigan.

“At 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday, July 26, 2011, all members of the City Council shall be prepared to show cause before the Court why: (i) the City of Detroit; (ii) City Council as a whole; and/or (iii) certain members of City Council should not be sanctioned for failure to take timely action with respect to the proposed settlement of this case, a proposed settlement that City Council has had in its possession fornearly three months.”

Zatkoff said if the Council does not approve the settlement, the case will proceed to trial.

Atty. Mark Fancher

To this date, the city has not disciplined or discharged the officers. Instead, Michael Osman was promoted to sergeant in the midst of the controversy. Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy has not brought charges of rape or any other offense against them. First-degree criminal sexual conduct is a capital offense in the state of Michigan, meaning it carries a possible sentence of life in prison.

In addition to the Michigan Citizen, The Final Call published an article by this reporter on the “Booty Boys.” (To read article, which details other cases and includes comments by ACLU attorney Mark Fancher, click on http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/National_News_2/article_6324.shtml)

*************************************************************************************Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself  to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE, along with other related issues like the genocide the U.S. and Israel are inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza, the world’s largest open-air prison. Funds will be needed Dec. 4  to pay VOD’s quarterly web hosting fee of $465.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. Box fee of $220/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

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MUSLIM LEADERS FROM MICHIGAN AND ACROSS THE U.S. #ABANDONBIDEN AS GAZA DEATH TOLL PASSES 11,000

EMERGENCY ALERT!

Israeli troops have invaded Gaza’s largest hospital, Al-Shifa, destroying medical equipment and initiating the deaths of hundreds inside and outside the hospital. See: https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/15/middleeast/shifa-hospital-gaza-idf-intl/index.html. Ongoing balanced coverage of events at https://aljazeera.com.

Rally is endorsed by MIMuslim Coalition, JVP DETROIT, Michigan Task Force For Palestine, American Muslims for Palestine, APIA Vote-MI, WWN, CAIR Michigan, Detroit Will Breathe, Women in Black, Detroit Kids matter, Students for Justice in Palestine, Flint Rising. U-Detroit Mercy SP, NNAAC (ACCESS), Democratic Socialists of America, and others

Premature infants forced out of incubators in Al Shifa hospital.

Follow-up at Hart Plaza, Thurs. Nov. 16, 6PM

Muslim Leaders in Michigan, and many other swing states,  pledge to “Abandon Biden” in 2024  election for greenlighting, funding Gaza genocide 

At least 11,078 Palestinians, including 4,500 children have been slaughtered, 1.5 million displaced, large part of Gaza’s infrastructure destroyed.

“We will not support those who support genocide!” 

Poll: Only 5 percent of Muslims now would vote for Biden, down from 80 percent in 2020

Massive marches, blockades, sit-ins, and more globally are challenging U.S.-Israel hegemony in the world

“Genocide Joe” revives U.S. movement to end two-party duopoly; 300,000+ turned out for March on Washington Nov. 4. Cease Fire!  Free Palestine! Palestine is Freeing Us

“From the River to the Sea!” Chant spreads globally;  counters Likud Party’s “Between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty.”

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (Michigan), the only Palestinian-American in Congress, stands up to censure for her stance, including River to Sea slogan

By Diane Bukowski, Editor

November 11, 2023

Note: VOD’s editorial comments in this story do not necessarily reflect the views of every Muslim leader who participated in this press conference Nov. 9. 

DETROIT — As Israel’s harrowing genocide of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and Lebanon continues, surpassing a total of 11,000 civilian deaths in Gaza alone, 4,500 of them children, Michigan’s Muslim leaders called on their constituencies and others to #AbandonBiden in the 2024 elections for endorsing Israel’s war against Palestine.

Imam Dawud Walid of Mi-CAIR spoke during 2015 rally for justice for Terrance Kellom, 19, and others killed by Detroit police and I.C.E. (VOD photo)

“Along with leaders in Minnesota, California, Wisconsin, Arizona, and other states, we are calling on the Muslim and Arab communities not to vote for Mr. Biden in the 2024 election,” Imam Dawud Walid announced Nov. 9,  at a press conference held in front of the McNamara Federal Building in downtown Detroit.

(The first video above expands Imam Walid’s remarks.)

The Greater Detroit area is home to one of the largest, oldest and most diverse Arab American communities in the western hemisphere.

Imam Walid is the Executive Director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MI) and member of the Imams Council of Michigan. For decades, he has also worked with communities of Blacks and others in metro Detroit, including the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality. 

Mona Mawari at community meeting

“Today we stand united in our demand for an unconditional and immediate ceasefire,” Mona Mawari, a Dearborn pharmacist and community activist whose family emigrated from Yemen,  said. (See second video above.)

“This is not a political stance. It’s a moral one. The Koran teaches us that saving one innocent life is akin to saving all of humanity. Pres. Biden has left us with no choice but to withdraw our support. We echo the sentiments of our community. Let this be a clear message to Pres. Biden and any future politician: ‘We will not support anyone who supports genocide.’”

Mawari said she campaigned among Muslims and Arab-Americans to bring out the vote for Biden in 2020. But she noted, a recent poll estimates that only five percent of that demographic now plan to support him in 2024, after 80 percent voted for him in 2020.

“Mr. President we will rally every voter in our community, our friends and allies to make sure you don’t win Michigan in 2024,” she said.

“This is a genocide, this is ethnic cleansing, and the blood is on Biden’s hands,” Imam Imran Salha of the Islamic Center of Detroit said, noting that Biden is bankrolling the slaughter. The Biden administration has asked for $14 billion in military aid to Israel, on top of its 1o-year $38 billion commitment, or $3.8 billion per year, beginning in 2015. See: Israel’s War in Gaza, Subsidized by the USA | The Nation

U.S. Pres. Joe Biden met with Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel as it slaughtered 4500 Palestinian children.

“The illegal Zionist regime, that is a non-state, has murdered one of my relatives in Ramallah. She was 37 years old with eight children,” Imam Salha said.

“[Biden] is a blood-thirsty murderer, who will be in the trash-can of history for killing innocent civilians. His only response is to say, ‘Don’t believe the statistics from the  Palestinians.'”

Hundreds of thousands of protesters across the globe have taken up the chant, “From the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free.”  Many supporters of the Zionist “state” of Israel claim this slogan challenges Israel’s right to exist and is anti-Semitic, confusing anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism.

But does Israel have a Right to Exist?

These critics ignore the history of the Zionist movement led since the beginning of the last century by Britain, France, the United States and other western imperialist powers greedy for control of the vast oil resources in the Middle East. Taking advantage of the suffering of European Jews and others during Hitler’s Holocaust, these countries funded the Zionist movement, which replicates the historical takeovers of indigenous peoples’ lands in the U.S. and around the world.

History shows that the majority of Jews who fled Europe during the Holocaust, who were not farmers, wanted to come to the United States, not Israel.

Palestine encompassed this land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea before Zionist occupation.

Netanyahu’s Likud Party says in its founding charter, “Between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty.” It adds, “A plan which relinquishes parts of western Eretz Israel, undermines our right to the country, unavoidably leads to the establishment of a ‘Palestinian State,’ jeopardizes the security of the population, endangers the existence of the State of Israel, and frustrates any prospect of peace.”  See http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Original-Party-Platform-of-the-Likud-Party-of-lsrael.pdf

Netanyahu, on behalf of the “State” of Israel, founded on the indigenous land of Palestine, thus makes it clear that his ultimate intent is to wipe Palestine and its people from the face of the earth. Numerous sources say Israel actually funded Hamas to interfere with the “Two-State Solution” which the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Yasser Arafat advocated in an attempt to protect their people from the bloodthirsty imperialists.

Some reporters at the Nov. 9 press conference challenged the Muslim leaders’ stance to
abandon Biden, asking what other plans the leaders have instead of letting Donald Trump and the Republicans win. The mainstream media appears to believe that the only possibilities for the people of the U.S. lie with a two-party system. It regularly publishes polls only of self-identified Democrats and Republicans, which purport to reflect the entirety of public opinion.

The historic turn-out of 300,000 people for the March on Washington Nov. 4 to support a cease-fire, the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, and freedom for Palestine, however, shows that a seismic change is taking place in the U.S. See ‘Palestine is Freeing Us’: 300,000 People March in Largest Pro-Palestine Protest in Washington, DC | Institute for Palestine Studies (palestine-studies.org)

Above: U.S. Representative Rashida Tlaib, backed by supporters behind her, condemned the U.S. Congress’ attempt to silence her, the only Palestinian-American in Congress.

Related: 

https://voiceofdetroit.net/2023/11/05/free-palestine-cease-fire-now-massive-rally-in-washington-d-c-not-seen-on-mainstream-media/

Local Muslim leaders vow to campaign against Biden unless he calls for cease-fire (startribune.com)

‘Palestine is Freeing Us’: 300,000 People March in Largest Pro-Palestine Protest in Washington, DC | Institute for Palestine Studies (palestine-studies.org)

#AbandonBiden, #CeaseFireNow, #FreePalestine, #FromtheRivertotheSea

*************************************************************************************Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself  to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE, along with other related issues like the genocide the U.S. and Israel are inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza, the world’s largest open-air prison. Funds will be needed Dec. 4  to pay VOD’s quarterly web hosting fee of $465.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. Box fee of $220/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod

 Cash App at (313) 825-6126

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FREE PALESTINE! CEASE FIRE NOW! MASSIVE RALLY IN WASHINGTON, D.C. NOT SEEN ON MAINSTREAM MEDIA


MANY MORE ACROSS THE U.S. AND THE WORLD

VOICE OF DETROIT is focusing on coverage of mass incarceration and the criminal actions of the police, largely in Michigan in its original stories. Gaza, part of the homeland of the Palestinian people, is considered the world’s largest open-air prison. This post is pinned to the top of our home page, so our readers can see the breadth and even revolutionary consciousness of the movement in support of the Palestinian people here in the U.S. The mainstream media here gave virtually no coverage to this protest and many more, as Israel, fully supported by the U.S. government and hundreds of billions in U.S. taxpayer dollars, carries out the massive slaughter and genocide of the Palestinian people.

U.S. REPRESENTATIVE RASHIDA TLAIB

To see more coverage, subscribe to the YouTube channel above, and watch Al Jazeera at Breaking News, World News and Video from Al Jazeera. Also follow our U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib as she stands heroically against the weight of the U.S. government to support her people and colonized peoples across the world.

 

In Michigan, Muslim Leaders are holding a press conference set for Thurs. 11/9/2023 at 12 Noon outside the Patrick V McNamara Federal Building 477 Michigan Ave. Detroit, MI. See: Gaza Massacre: Michigan Muslim Leaders Call to #AbandonBiden in 2024 Election http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Michigan-Muslim-Leaders-Call-to-AbandonBiden-in-2024-Election-110647-PR.pdf.

In 2010, Imam Dawud Walid (center) called for DOJ civil rights investigation into the assassination of Imam Luqman Abdullah in Dearborn, MI in 2009.

Muslim Michigan leaders, echoing the sentiment of their communities, are pledging to  #AbandonBiden.

With over 10,000 Palestinans killed, 75% of them women and children, the Biden Administration has facilitated the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza through its refusal to demand a ceasefire.

Furthermore, the Administration has pursued additional aid for the Israeli government as it actively continues its mass murder of entire families and communities in Gaza.

Earlier, Minnesota Muslim leaders urged President Biden to call for an immediate ceasefire to the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Gaza by Oct. 31, 2023.
Now that the Ceasefire Deadline has passed, Muslim Michigan leaders are pledging to
#AbandonBiden and actively campaign for their communities to follow suit.

The press conference will include speakers from the Michigan Muslim community including: ● Imam Dawud Walid ● Mona Mawari ● Imam Imran Salha ● Shaykh Mohamed Almasmari and others.

Genocide in Gaza. AP Photo

Related from Minnesota Star-Tribune

Local Muslim leaders vow to campaign against Biden unless he calls for cease-fire (startribune.com)

VOD will be covering this event, as part of its commitment to call for the overturn of Police State(s) and Prison Nation(s). Gaza is known as the world’s largest open-air prison. The tens of billions of our tax dollars used to finance  genocide in Gaza and a neo-fascist government in Ukraine should be going to support the needs of the people, to provide jobs/ liveable income, education, housing with water, electricity/heat, and education through the college level. The provision of these needs for ALL will combat the genocidal mass incarceration of those from communities of color and poor communities.

************************************************************************************

Voice of Detroit is a pro bono newspaper, now devoting itself entirely to stories related to our PRISON NATION and POLICE STATE. Funds are needed regularly to pay quarterly web hosting fee of $460.00 and other expenses. VOD will disappear from the web if fee not paid.

VOD’s editors and reporters, most of whom live on fixed incomes or are incarcerated, are not paid for their work. Ongoing costs include quarterly web charges of $460.00, P.O. box fee of $180/yr. and other costs including utility and internet bills, costs for research including court records and internet fees, office supplies, gas, etc.

Please DONATE TO VOD at:

https://www.gofundme.com/donate-to-vod

 Cash App at (313) 825-6126

************************************************************************************

 

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