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Health & Fitness

Cushingberry: What we know and where it will go

Disclaimer: I am on a first-name basis with the Councilman, who I have interviewed on several occasions. The second man in the car, Richard Clement, has been my friend for more than four years. 

Rick Thompson

 

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DETROIT: Newly-elected Detroit City Council member George Cushingberry was issued a traffic ticket this week.

That’s a fact.

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Detroit and national media have taken the traffic stop and turned it into a story of epic proportions. Allegations of alcohol and marijuana in the car, accusations of misbehavior by police officers and a supervisor, varied responses from other Council members- all have fueled the frenzy of media attention.

Let’s take a moment and separate the facts from the hype and see what we’re really looking at.

FACTS

Two black men left a restaurant in Detroit driving a 20-year old Buick. Police pulled them over for failing to use a turn signal. Officers ordered the driver to shut off his car; after an extended wait in the freezing temperatures the driver turned the car back on to warm up. Officers rushed the car, pulled the men out, handcuffed them together and searched the vehicle. A bottle of rum was discovered and the smell of marijuana was detected. More officers arrived; the marijuana was voluntarily surrendered to the police, who verified that it belonged to a registered patient and then returned it to that person. A police Supervisor was called to the scene, decided that the bottle was empty and allowed the men to return to their car and warm up. The additional officers and the Supervisor left. The original officers issued the driver a citation for failing to signal when leaving the restaurant and everyone drove away.

The driver was Detroit City Council President pro tem George Cushingberry and the passenger was his aide, Richard Clement.

Is failing to use a turn signal- in Detroit- a crime of significance? It’s hard to imagine any danger was posed to the public by this simple act of forgetfulness. Would the officer’s time be better spent chasing down speeding automobiles, or those that are being driven in a reckless fashion? Of course it would. Police used a flimsy excuse to pull over two black men in an old automobile. I imagine there are thousands of Detroiters and suburban residents who have experienced this ‘special attention’.

Is having an empty bottle of booze in your car a crime? In Michigan it cannot be. We have a bottle deposit law that requires us to return alcoholic beverage containers to the market for recycling. Beer bottles and rum bottles are the same, legally speaking. It may not be smart to carry empty rum bottles in your car but it is not criminal.

Is carrying marijuana in your car a crime for a card-carrying member of the medical marijuana program?  Patients are allowed to possess up to 2.5 ounces (70 grams) at any given time, and Clement had just a single marijuana cigarette in his possession. Although his quantity was allowable, Michigan has a new law that requires marijuana to be carried in the trunk of a vehicle. Technically, Mr. Clement failed to stow his 0.5 gram joint in the trunk.

THE FALLOUT

News agencies  have twisted this story into an issue far larger than the facts support. Some have suggested that Cushingberry left a strip club called Starvin Marvin’s instead of a restaurant; a news interview with the waiter who served Cushingberry and Clement debunks this myth. The waiter states clearly in the interview that the Councilman had a single alcoholic beverage during dinner, disproving any suggestion that his driving was impaired by alcohol.

The Councilman never was in possession of marijuana. There is no evidence that the Councilman was using marijuana. No field sobriety test was issued to him. Nevertheless, guilt by association is part of a newsman’s arsenal of insinuation and pot is a hot topic among journalists.

Mr. Clement is not in jeopardy. Neither are the two original officers. The consequence for the media’s exaggerated evaluation of this incident will fall on Cushingberry and the police Supervisor who was called to the scene.

The officers allege that the Supervisor acted improperly by denying them the ability to arrest the Councilman. Detroit Police policy requires a Supervisor to be present when investigations involve high-profile persons. One can assume that the logic and clear-thinking of a Supervisor is necessary to avoid allowing beat cops to establish a big reputation for themselves by arresting a prominent media figure on a trumped-up charge. Those arrests become lawsuits, which in turn become financial drains on the city. An internal investigation has been launched by the Detroit Police Department into the actions of the Supervisor on that evening.

For Mr. Cushingberry, the fallout could be felt in two ways: his potential for re-election by the public and disciplinary action by city officials or the Emergency Financial Manager, Kevin Orr.

Regarding disciplinary action, City Council President Brenda Jones said it best in a news interview: “This is a traffic ticket.” Her simple statement shows there is at least one person on Council who has retained the proper perspective. On the grand scheme of things, this does not rate any attention by Council or by newly-elected mayor Mike Duggan. Both Duggan and Orr have wisely remained mute on the issue so far. I expect they will not fall into the media frenzy. These are two smart men who can spot a non-issue when they see one.

As for the people of the city of Detroit, this event may discourage a few from endorsing Cushingberry in the future but this incident will endear him to most Detroiters. Being pulled over for “driving while black,” as Cushingberry described the incident, is a commonly-held experience for many voting adults in the state’s large cities. Forced to stand outside in the cold, being searched for pot and having an empty bottle used as a reason to hassle a citizen: this is a common story. The fact that the Councilman drives an older automobile makes him just like most of the voters in his 2nd District. It was only two months ago that those voters put him in office; their support for the man named Cush is at it’s strongest.

Cushingberry should escape this non-story without any demerits, and it could in fact drive him to demand change in the Detroit Police Department. If this incident results in a more citizen-friendly approach by police, or if it drives officers to focus on behavior that is demonstrably dangerous to citizens, then this hype will not have been in vain.

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