A sheriff’s deputy who arrested a Black Michigan man for “soliciting” though he was only collecting signatures to help his community has been fired.
The announcement about the unidentified deputy’s termination was made by Calhoun County Sheriff Steve Hinkley and Undersheriff Timothy Hurtt on Friday, Jan. 22 after an internal investigation, MLive reported.
“We hold ourselves to high standards of professionalism to the communities we protect. When we are right, we are right. When we are wrong, we admit we are wrong. On January 2, we were wrong,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement.
La’Ron Marshall, 44, was going door to door on Jan. 2 collecting signatures to form a tenant association where he lives at the Wyndtree Apartments where he lives in the southern Michigan town of Springfield. He was approached by while he was at his neighbor Kimberly Totzke’s apartment by two deputies who said they’d received a call about someone soliciting.
Calhoun County Sheriff Steve Hinkley has fired a department deputy. The deputy was one of two responding to a call recently to a rental housing complex in Springfield. The caller thought a man might have been illegally soliciting residents at Wyndtree Apartments in Springfield. During the initial contact between deputies, the man refused to provide his identity. He was arrested for resisting and obstructing police. It later turned out he was trying to gather petition signatures to possibly form a tenant association. Springfield has no ordinance against soliciting. The man, 44-year-old La’Ron Marshall, who lives at that rental complex, has already received an apology from the department for the incident. Sheriff Steve Hinkley came on the 95.3 WBCK Morning Show ten days after the incident and acknowledged the department s mistake.
A Calhoun County Sheriff Department deputy has been fired after he arrested a man early this month while circulating petitions.
Sheriff Steve Hinkley said in a statement Friday afternoon that the deputy, who was not named, was fired following a review of the incident by the department s Office of Professional Standards. We hold ourselves to high standards of professionalism to the communities we protect. When we are right, we are right. When we are wrong, we admit we are wrong. On January 2, we were wrong, Hinkley said.
La Ron Marshall, 44, was arrested on a charge of resisting and obstructing police after two deputies approached him about possible solicitation at Wyndtree Apartments in Springfield, where he lives.