Read two years of MSU Police misconduct cases

At Michigan State University, there’s a simple answer for what to do when you believe a campus police officer has wronged you: file a complaint. 

You can send an email to the police department, make a phone call or come in person. It's the same process followed by employees of MSU Department of Police and Public Safety, or DPPS, when they are concerned about the conduct of their coworkers.

But what happens after that?

Unlike some police departments, MSU DPPS doesn’t voluntarily publicize its misconduct cases. That means the nature of the complaints and the findings of the investigations the department conducts into them are only released in response to public records requests.

In the interest of transparency, and in an attempt to better understand the issues within the department, The State News filed nearly two dozen Freedom of Information Act requests for these internal affairs investigations.

What we got back — 35 cases in total, covering September 2022 to October 2024 — don’t necessarily point to any one systemic issue. But they do contextualize internal conflict within the department and police’s occasionally tense relationship with the MSU community. They range from mundane (an officer disciplined for skipping work) to expected (a driver upset at being pulled over for speeding) to consequential (an officer fired for harassment).

A department spokesperson largely declined to comment on individual cases.

A few takeaways:

At least one employee was fired. In the fall of 2023, an officer was fired for harassment, but any further details are redacted. Another employee was escorted out of the building in 2024 after deleting sensitive files. 

One employee was investigated four times. Four complaints were filed against the same officer in two months. One claimed he dismissed concerns over an individual who had talked about weapons and hurting people. Another said he abruptly cut off conversation with an individual in a disability accessible vehicle that was in need of assistance. Neither were found credible, but two other complaints that came from the officer's coworkers were: A sergeant doing an annual review noticed that the officer hadn’t gone through the proper licensing and training required to carry his firearm, and a lieutenant reported that he didn't show up to a scheduled shift.

When a citizen files a complaint, the department usually sides with its own officers. But don’t take that as an indication of bias, says Joseph De Angelis, who teaches criminology and sociology at the University of Idaho. It's common for the "sustain rate" — the percentage of investigations that result in findings against the officers — to be much lower for external complaints than internal ones. Unlike DPPS employees, citizen complainants typically don't know what would violate the department’s policies or have first-hand knowledge of what happened, he said. DPPS spokesperson Nadia Vizueta said the department "side(s) with the truth on every matter."

Police sometimes mishandled cases of Relationship Violence and Sexual Misconduct. One officer suggested a survivor was "making stuff up." Another questioned a survivor’s credibility based on the way they recounted what had happened to them. Yet another violated widely-circulated protocols requiring employees to report suspected violations of RVSM to an investigatory body. And sometimes, DPPS employees themselves faced accusations of sexual misconduct. 

Police initiated several car chases that they shouldn’t have. De Angelis says it is common for there to be greater scrutiny around vehicle pursuits since they are likely to lead to lawsuits. MSU's strict policy on such pursuits was broken by several officers. One unapproved chase ended in someone crashing into a tree. Two other officers ran red lights.

Several complaints had to do with improper use of technology. One employee deleted 114 sensitive files. Another inappropriately used department software. Another made edits to files they shouldn’t have.

Attendance was a persistent concern. Several employees were disciplined for not showing up to their shifts. Other complaints about attendance bordered on conspiratorial; one accused an employee of lying about being out sick, while another reported a suspicious scheduling pattern.

Want to read the full set of internal affairs investigations for yourself? Below we’ve written concise summaries of each and every case on interactive cards.

The first side of each card shows who made the complaint and what they claimed happened. Tap the screen or hover over it with your mouse and it will flip over to the other side, where you’ll see what the department’s investigation found and its ultimate determination.

Some parts of the cards are blank, as many of the files were heavily redacted if not missing information altogether. Most of the cards also lack documentation of what, if any, disciplinary action was given to officers who broke policies. Vizueta said such personnel decisions are generally made by Human Resources, and are therefore stored on separate documents that were not provided in response to The State News' public records requests.