A Detroit police commissioner is accusing Chief James White of deceiving the public about an officer who punched an elderly man outside of a Midtown bar last month.
The man, 70-year-old Daryl Vance, later died from his injuries.
Commissioner Ricardo R. Moore says White drastically changed the narrative surrounding the incident after it became clear that Vance was in grave condition.
“This is police corruption at the highest level of the organization,” Moore tells Metro Times, saying White “was obviously covering up for the officer” at first.
In a letter to White on Monday morning, Commissioner Moore said the chief committed “police misconduct … based on dishonesty, deception and an abuse of your authority.”
“Police morale, public trust and confidence are the paramount factors,” Moore wrote. “How can the media and public have trust and confidence in a Pinocchio-type police chief deceiving them?”
Vance was on life support before he died last month.
In a lengthy response, White dismissed Moore's complaint as "a headline-seeking move for relevance" and "just another example of the unprofessional nature that has become expected" from the commissioner. (See White's full response below)
White initially suspended Officer Juwan Brown with pay after he punched Vance in the jaw outside of the Garden Bowl on Sept. 1, causing him to fall and strike his head. Brown left Vance’s lifeless body sprawled out along Woodward Avenue and failed to provide medical attention before emergency personnel arrived, a witness told Metro Times last month.
In a news release two days later, White said Vance appeared to strike the officer in the head, prompting Brown to punch “the individual in the area of the jaw.”
White repeated that narrative in an internal memo on Sept. 11, saying Vance “became verbally combative, physically aggressive and threatening.”
“Ultimately, Officer Brown physically engaged Mr. Vance in order to gain his compliance,” White’s memo read. “In response, Mr. Vance swung at Officer Brown, striking him in the face. Officer Brown countered Mr. Vance’s aggression with a hand strike to Mr. Vance’s face, causing him to fall backwards over the sidewalk curb to the street, striking the back of his head on the pavement.”
Four days later, White wrote a memo to the Board of Police Commissioners that was dramatically different, saying Brown was also combative, “escalated the situation,” and told Vance “he would break his jaw” and “knock him out.”
White’s new narrative was closer to what a witness described to Metro Times. The witness said the officer was aggressive and “squared up” twice with Vance, who “moved slowly” because of his age. After Vance appeared to lunge at Brown, the cop pushed him, squared up again, and then punched him in the jaw, causing him to fall backwards from a curb onto a parking spot along Woodward, the witness said.
“Officer Brown failed to de-escalate and, instead, escalated the situation by reaching out and touching the citizen’s waist,” White wrote in the memo. “Both individuals took a fighting stance. Officer Brown told the citizen that he would break his jaw or he could move along. Officer Brown further stated that he was going to knock him out. The citizen told Officer Brown not to touch him again, and in response, Officer Brown reached over to touch the citizen’s shoulders. The citizen parried Officer Brown’s contact and then stiff armed Officer Brown in the face. Officer Brown countered with a punch toward the citizen’s face while advancing on him.”
In the memo, White recommended that Brown be suspended without pay.
On Friday, commissioners voted 8-2 in favor of suspending Brown without pay.
Michigan State Police are investigating Brown’s actions.
In his letter to White, Moore said the police chief lied to the public in the past about his officers’ actions.
“This is not the first time you’ve done this,” Moore wrote. “The first time I saw misconduct of this nature was in a closed door session of a Board of Police Commissioner’s meeting. You held a press conference and told the public the police officers actions were justified against a woman, Ki’Azia Miller, that was having a mental health crisis (she was shot to death by police). You then attempted to suspend three (3) members without pay.”
White's full response to Metro Times:
"Commissioner Moore's conduct in this latest headline-seeking move for relevance is just another example of the unprofessional nature that has become expected from this member of the Board. In doing this, Commissioner Moore is attempting to distract the public from the Board's own recent shortcomings, at least some of which are now the subject of an OIG inquiry, including a more than 600 case backlog of citizen complaints and the recent arrest of a former board chair. The citizens deserve better, and it is my sincere hope that media outlets see through his attempts to mislead the public under the guise of "oversight."
In his e-mail to me, Commissioner Moore alleged that the Department issued a press release claiming that the subject of a recent use of force had head-butted an officer. This statement is false. Nowhere in the press release was it alleged Mr. Vance had head-butt the involved officer.
In fact, the statement reflected that the “the video . . . appears to show the individual strike the officer on the head and the officer responds by the striking the individual in the area of the jaw.” This was supported by review of video and considered while the preliminary statement was being drafted. Like in all critical incidents, our goal is to get facts out as soon as possible so that the public is informed. We issue statements knowing that additional facts will be uncovered as the investigation unfolds. As indicated in the statement, I immediately suspended the involved member under the DPOA contract. This was later memorialized in a memorandum for internal use, specifically to ensure the change in the officer’s duty status was appropriately recorded.
After initial investigation, I took further action against the officer to have him suspended without pay, which the Board approved.
Commissioner Moore went to great lengths in failing to highlight several facts, including that (1) DPD supervisors elevated this use of force to senior management; (2) that the DPD pulled video and other evidence and immediately suspended the officer with pay; (3) that the DPD issued a public statement following the incident based on what it had gathered at the time; (4) that the DPD generated memorandums regarding the incident and ultimately brought this matter to the Board to have the officer suspended without pay; (5) that the DPD gave a public presentation to the Board on this matter; (6) that the DPD referred this matter to the Michigan State Police for investigation; and (7) and that the DPD is also running a parallel administrative investigation into the officer’s actions.
Even more disturbing is Commissioner Moore's claim of a "cover up" based on a press release made public by the Department and documents that the Department was responsible for creating relative to administrative action taken against the officer. Commissioner Moore claims that the two documents contradict each other. This is not true. The second memorandum was more detailed because it was to be shared with the Board prior to a hearing in which the Department would have the burden of demonstrating that the incident rose to the level of requiring an officer to be suspended without pay. The idea that the Department attempted to cover up misconduct by authoring press releases and memoranda outlining misconduct is pure contradiction. In regards to Commissioner Moore’s allegations about the Ki’Azia Miller investigation: an officer’s actions may be legally justified, but at the same time not comport to this Department’s expectations and values. This is illustrated by the fact that the prosecutor’s office decided not to charge the involved members. However, the prosecutor's decision in this matter does not relieve the Department of its responsibility to hold members accountable for administrative violations of this Department's own policies and procedures. The irony here is that I am forced to justify holding members accountable to a member of the oversight body, who has had numerous opportunities to question me about these decisions in the public forum that the Board meetings offer.
So Commissioner Moore's intent with his e-mail is clear. Regrettably, through all of this, Commissioner Moore is getting just what he wants: a headline regardless of whether it is factual or not.
I call on Commissioner Moore to direct his efforts to those issues that fall within his charter-mandated responsibility – e.g., the more than 600 backlogged OCI complaints, the timeliness of OCI investigations, and the Board’s decorum during meetings.
The Department will continue to be transparent with the community in all officer-involved incidents, providing them with the most up-to-date information as it becomes available."
Subscribe to Metro Times newsletters.
Follow us: Google News | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter
