Detroit Police Department Hoo boy, where to begin with DPD’s many dubious achievements this year. In February, Detroit police shut down a traditional sugarbush ceremony led by Indigenous residents who were collecting maple syrup in Rouge Park, a repeat offense for DPD. (The department apologized.) In September, DPD suspended Officer Janelle Zielinski, a bodybuilder who also had a side hustle running an OnlyFans account that the department apparently considered unbecoming of a police officer in what critics say is a sexist double-standard. (Zielinski resigned; she appears to still be making porn.) Then, in October, the department was ordered to pay $1 million for responding to protesters against police brutality with more police brutality. And let’s not forget former DPD chief Jame Craig leaving his position for an embarrassing run for governor, which started with a campaign launch event with inadequate security and basically ended with him getting knocked off the ballot for failing to collect enough valid signatures. —Lee DeVito Credit: Lester Graham / Shutterstock.com

Police in Michigan have fatally shot 135 people since 2015, with 19 of those deaths occurring so far in 2022, according to a database from The Washington Post.

Of the shootings, 25 occurred in Detroit, with 10 of them taking place since March 2021.

Statewide, 35 of the fatal shootings involved a person experiencing a mental health crisis.

Two of the fatal shootings involved teenagers under the age of 18.

All but five of the victims were men, and at least 11 were unarmed.

A disproportionate number of the victims were Black. In a state where the 13.6% of the population is Black, 32.6% of the victims were Black.

The rate is likely higher because the race of the victim was unknown in 18 shootings.

The Detroit Police Department led the state in fatal shootings with 23. Michigan State Police was second with 19.

Fatal shootings have been on the rise statewide, with 43 of them occurring in the past two years.

Body cam footage was only available in 20 of the fatal shootings since 2015.

Police are rarely charged in fatal shootings, but the exact number isn’t known because the database doesn’t include this information.

One of the exceptions was in the fatal shooting of Patrick Patrick Lyoya, who was unarmed when he was shot in the head during a traffic stop in Grand Rapids on April 4. The officer was charged with second-degree murder and is awaiting trial.

According to the data, nationwide, police shot and killed 8,015 people since 2015, with 1,084 of them occurring so far this year.

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This article appears in Dec 14-20, 2022.

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Steve Neavling is an award-winning investigative journalist who operated Motor City Muckraker, an online news site devoted to exposing abuses of power and holding public officials accountable. Neavling...

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