September 14, 2020
How Detroit's Police Chief Saved His City from Black Lives Matter
By
T.R. Clancy
Detroit Will Breathe, the Motor City's BLM franchisee, won a hollow victory last week when a federal judge issued a
temporary restraining order that bars Detroit police from using certain non-lethal tactics on "peaceful protesters."
Detroit police chief
James Craig responded to the TRO with a shrug. It changes nothing, he told reporters, because that's how his department always handles peaceful protesters. "Every time we've had to use less-than-lethal force, it's been to address violence by protesters, resisting arrest, or when they've tried to take over an intersection in violation of the law."
Compared to the conflagrations BLM has incited in cities like Minneapolis, Portland, Seattle, New York, Chicago, and even Kenosha, Detroit Will Breathe has been an epic flop. Drawing
mostly small crowds and desperate for
media attention, DWB's been stifled from the get-go by Chief Craig's zero-tolerance approach to thugs and looters posing as demonstrators. The first three nights after George Floyd's death, when radicals — most from out of town and some
armed with bricks and railroad spikes — ignored a curfew and tried to turn the city into another Minneapolis, Detroit police pushed back hard, using tear gas and making over
140 arrests. That quieted things. A few days later, Detroit Will Breathe somehow finagled a meeting with Mayor Mike Duggan and Chief Craig to lay out their list of demands, like "demilitarizing the police" and making Detroit a sanctuary city. Group organizer and Keeper of the Bullhorn Tristan Taylor felt cocky enough to brag to reporters that the meeting "was
on our terms" because "[t]he movement is strong." But not strong enough to mau-mau Duggan and Craig, who nodded pleasantly and then lost their copies of the list.
A few weeks ago, bored with peacefully marching all over without a news crew in sight, DWB decided to try occupying a
major downtown intersection. After an hour of demonstrators defying orders to disperse, police moved in and arrested 44 DWB members, encountering the predictable violent resistance. When the
inevitable hue and cry was raised over how rough some of the arrests were ("I've never seen a use of force that
looks good," Craig remarked), the chief stood his ground. "I am
not going to let any group set up a
Seattle zone of lawlessness here in the city of Detroit," Craig said. "That is non-negotiable."
After that, the group added Chief Craig's resignation to their list of demands.
Craig sees right through Detroit Will Breathe's "untruthful" message and calls their leaders "misguided radicals." He grew up in Detroit, where he witnessed the 1967 riots — the worst in American history until L.A. took the record in 1992 after the Rodney King verdict. Craig was there for that mayhem, too, as an LAPD officer. After the L.A. riot was declared
an insurrection, the Marines and the U.S. Army ended it. Craig knows firsthand that the worst thing you can do when faced with radical lawlessness is agree to negotiate.
He gets away with his outspoken disrespect for DWB because he has
Mayor Duggan's support (a Democrat!) and understands that Detroiters at large are "fed up" with groups like DWB "
fomenting chaos." He also knows that their agenda doesn't have widespread support from Detroiters, "because the
vast majority of the people who attend these protests are from outside the city." Of the 44 people arrested in August, 27 were from other Michigan cities; one came all the way from California.
At the news briefing the day after the failed occupation, Deputy Chief Todd Bettison's message for the group was also short and to the point: "Detroit Will Breathe,
you are not welcome. Go." Area leftists, who called Bettison's message "
blunt, if not anti-democratic," took issue with the suggestion that most Detroiters weren't happy with DWB's agenda. The Metro Times, the area's pinkish entertainment tabloid, argued illogically that Detroiters
must support the protests because they're "organized by Detroit activists."
Because even the activists didn't believe that, they quickly ran to federal court and filed a lawsuit against the police department, the city, Craig, and about a hundred officers, alleging they'd been victims of "excessive force," arrested "en masse" without probable cause, and variously maltreated for no other reason than their peaceable stand against systemic racism. Federal lawsuits are a surefire way to attract media attention, at least for one news cycle; and even if you're sure to lose in the end, you can demand an injunction on the first day, pleading all sorts of ugly stuff the other side must be immediately stopped from doing. If the judge grants your injunction (they're temporary, and this one is for only two weeks), you get to claim victory.
Chief Craig didn't blink. The reason he could say "
nothing has changed" is that what U.S. District Judge Laurie J. Michelson's order requires of his officers "is no different than what we've always done" and even '"reinforces' the department's policy." For him, the lawsuit amounts to just "another example of the perpetual false narrative" of systemic police misconduct. His officers don't use force with peaceful protesters, he says, but "
f someone is resisting arrest, or trying to attack our officers, we will use the force that's both reasonable and necessary to overcome the resistance." City attorney Lawrence Garcia, who says he's "pleased" with the lawsuit and looks forward to filing a countersuit, can see how DWB deliberately provokes conflict with police: "Wearing a bulletproof vest to a protest shows a certain desire and intent."
