On February 8, 2006, police in Benton Harbor, Michigan, arrested 25-year-old Jameel McGee and charged him with possession with intent to deliver or manufacture less than 50 grams of cocaine.
Officer Andrew Collins said in an arrest report that he had listened in on a call made by a confidential informant who sought to buy an ounce of crack cocaine from McGee. After reaching an agreement on terms, Collins said, the informant and McGee arranged a meeting. McGee didn’t show, and the informant called him again. Later, when McGee arrived at the meeting place, Collins and another officer showed up and ordered McGee and the driver out of the car.
Collins said he saw a small amount of marijuana on the car’s floor, and he called an assistant district attorney who said that there was probable cause to search the vehicle. Collins said he found an ounce of cocaine in a baggie in the console.
Collins arrested McGee and read him his Miranda rights. According to a court filing, McGee said: “It’s not my vehicle, it’s not my crack, and I don’t know shit.”
Collins testified about the arrest at a preliminary hearing in Berrien County Circuit Court, but the case was transferred to U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan.
McGee’s trial began and ended on April 25, 2006. According to a trial memorandum by the government, a laboratory analysis reported that the substance in the baggie was crack cocaine, with a weight of 24.7 grams. (An ounce is 28.4 grams). The memorandum also said that no usable prints were recovered from the baggie.
Collins testified about the transaction and arrest. A Berrien County sheriff’s deputy testified that he spoke with McGee while transporting McGee to federal court for an initial appearance. The deputy said that McGee said the crack belonged to the driver, and that McGee was accompanying him because the man was disabled and could not drive and talk on his cellphone at the same time.
McGee did not testify or present any evidence. The jury convicted McGee later that day on the possession charge, and Judge Robert Bell later sentenced him to 9 years in prison.
McGee appealed, arguing among other things, that he had been denied his constitutional rights to confront an accuser, because the confidential informant didn’t testify. Moreover, Collins’s testimony about the informant’s statements inculpating McGee were hearsay, the motion said.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed the conviction on June 26, 2008. The court said that some of Collins’s testimony referencing his conversation with the informant shouldn’t have been admitted by Judge Bell, as it violated the Confrontation Clause. But the court said the error was harmless, based on the totality of the prosecution’s case.
On February 20, 2008, the police department fired Collins after a supervisor found a lockbox under a desk that contained cocaine, heroin, and marijuana. The cocaine was packaged in small baggies.
Collins was indicted on a single count of drug possession by a federal grand jury on November 26, 2008. Corporal Bernard Hall Jr., his supervisor, was indicted on July 16, 2009 on three counts: conspiracy to violate civil rights, giving false declaration to a grand jury, and giving a false statement to the FBI.
After the indictments, Berrien County Prosecutor Arthur Cotter began reviewing cases where Collins and Hall were the arresting officers. Approximately 65 defendants had their convictions vacated based on misconduct by Collins and Hall.
Collins pled guilty in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan on January 26, 2009 to possession. He was sentenced to 37 months in prison. Hall pled guilty in U.S. District Court on August 25, 2009 to the conspiracy charge and was later sentenced to 30 months in prison.
Collins testified at Hall’s sentencing hearing that he and Hall embezzled from the police department by receiving reimbursement for drug buys that never happened. They also began taking money from defendants and then under-reporting the amount of cash recovered in the evidence reports.
“I think it got to the point where we would talk about it,” Collins said. “So I asked him, I said, ‘Do you think God cares if this is drug money that we are stealing?’ And he kind of, you know, shook his head and said, ‘I know, I know, it’s been hitting me too.’ We both said, ‘let’s stop, let’s stop, let’s start doing things right.’ Then, you know, just the addiction to the money, the next person we would arrest would have a couple thousand dollars on him, and we would take money from him. It just kept happening that way. We would try to stop, and then we wouldn’t.”
After Collins’s plea, on February 2, 2009, federal prosecutors and McGee’s attorney filed a joint motion to vacate McGee’s conviction and dismiss his charge. The motion said that Collins had falsified information on search warrants and testified falsely at trials. “This information, along with significant additional information pertaining to former Officer Collins’s criminal conduct under color of law, constitutes new evidence warranting a new trial in the interest of justice,” the motion said.
Judge Bell granted the motion that same day. McGee was released from prison on February 4, 2009.
In the wake of the scandal, 85 plaintiffs—some whose charges were dismissed prior to trial—filed lawsuits against Collins, Hall, and the city of Benton Harbor.
McGee filed his lawsuit on August 31, 2009. He claimed that Collins had planted the marijuana and crack cocaine in the vehicle. The lawsuit was settled for an undisclosed sum in 2012.
– Ken Otterbourg
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