Feds Step In to Help Dearborn Police Rebuild Trust After Shootings

DEARBORN, MI – The Justice Department said Wednesday that it is stepping in to help the Dearborn police department rebuild trust among residents after a recent pair of unrelated fatal shootings of unarmed black suspects by white police officers.

The U.S. Justice Department’s intervention comes at the police department's request, according to Wednesday's announcement. It also responds to requests for federal involvement from civil rights groups and others since the Christmas week shooting of Christmas week shooting of Kevin Matthew, 35, of Detroit, who died of multiple gunshot wounds.

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About a month later, Janet Wilson, 31, of Detroit, was shot and killed by after a short police pursuit following a disturbance with a Fairlane Town Center mall security officer.

The Justice Department’s help comes in the form of technical assistance offered through the COPS Office — Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. More details about the assistance will be shared at a news conference in Dearborn Thursday.

In the first shooting on Dec. 23, police said Matthews crossed over the Dearborn boundary with Detroit, and was shot in a struggle for a police officer’s gun.

Several protest marches were held, including one that threatened to shut down the busy Michigan Avenue retail corridor.

“We have to send a message throughout the nation that it is not OK for young African-American, unarmed men to continue to get shot down by police," The Rev. Charles Williams, president of the Detroit chapter of the National Action Network, said at the time.

In the second incident, on Jan. 27, Wilson was shot dead after she allegedly attempted to run over a police, who pursued her after the dispute with the security officer.

Wilson’s niece, Cassie Bass, said the officers who shot her aunt should be held accountable. "This is a murder," Bass said at a February rally calling for justice in her aunt’s death. "If I was a murderer, I would be behind bars, underneath the jail."

Lt. Mike Shaw of the Michigan State Police said in the days following Wilson’s death that Wilson didn’t have a gun, but was “armed with a three-ton vehicle” and the officers’ response seemed reasonable under the circumstances.

Minister and Detroit activist Malik Shabazz said at the time that police could have employed other methods, such as throwing stop sticks on the road or shooting out the vehicle’s tires, to deter Wilson, who he said was “killed … worse than a dog.”

“The community’s eyes are on this,” he said.