Time is quickly approaching for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to potentially launch a significant operation in Wisconsin, warns Darryl Morin, national president of Forward Latino. 

“Unless there is a significant change in priorities, there will be a large enforcement action in Wisconsin,” Morin said in an email to supporters Saturday night. 

Forward Latino is a national nonprofit advocacy organization based in Milwaukee that addresses community empowerment, democracy, civil rights and other issues such as hate crimes, gun violence and immigration. 

The organization is a host of the annual Emergency Gun Violence Summit in Milwaukee. 

Morin said there is general consensus at various levels of government that leads him to believe a wide-scale ICE operation is coming to the state. He’s urging residents and others to prepare for that possibility. 

“It is important that we do not cause panic, but encourage thoughtful planning and preparation,” he said. 

Morin shared a number of resources in his email, including family-planning “to-do lists”; constitutional rights cards; and information for employers if ICE comes to their workplace. The information is available in English and Spanish on the Forward Latino website. 

Protests in Minnesota

Morin’s warning comes as wide-scale protests continue in Minnesota over immigration enforcement operations there and the shooting death of Renee Good in Minneapolis by an ICE agent on Jan. 7. 

A surge of more than 2,000 federal officers in the Twin Cities has pitted city and state officials against the federal government, sparked daily clashes between activists and immigration officers and left Renee Good, a mother of three, dead.

President Donald Trump initially threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act in Minnesota in response to the protests, which would allow the deployment of active-duty military troops there. He backed off on that threat Friday.

Critics have accused Trump of abusing his power.

Residents prepare for ICE operations in Milwaukee

Drea Rodriguez, global program officer at WomenServe, which works for gender equity, said she’s received more requests than ever from residents to coordinate “know your rights” training in Milwaukee. 

“Trump has already proven he cares more about profit over people. We are an immigrant city,” Rodriguez said. “Soon we will be in his crosshairs again. No one is safe. Stay ready.” 

Rodriguez said that while the protests against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Minnesota and elsewhere are important, people should also limit business with companies that support Trump. 

South Side resident Juanita Lara said her intuition is to carry her birth certificate as a precaution in case she’s stopped by an ICE agent. 

Erika Wilson-Hale, who also lives on the South Side, said she believes parents should be careful about sending their undocumented children to school and that residents should take caution. 

“If ICE does come you better be prepared, you better be ready,” she said. “Be wary because your rights will be violated. We are in scary times.” 

Elected officials discuss possibility of ICE operations

State Rep. Ryan Clancy, D-Milwaukee, wrote in a Facebook post Saturday, Jan. 17, that “it’s not a matter of if (ICE) comes, it’s when.”  

Clancy said Milwaukee doesn’t have a substantial plan to keep the community safe from ICE, but he and others do. 

“The plan is that the community keeps us safe, through Voces de la Frontera’s ICE hotline and Comité Sin Fronteras ‘community verifier‘ program, through legal observers, through legislation and through mass mobilization,” he said. 

Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley said in a prior email to NNS that, although the county cannot legally impede or interfere with the actions of federal immigration agents, “we will do everything in our power to keep our communities safe, informed and prepared.”

Mayor Cavalier Johnson said during a news conference after the Good shooting that federal immigration enforcement poses a risk to public safety. 

“Occupying cities and targeting immigrant communities simply does not make our communities safer,” Johnson said.

Milwaukee Ald. Alex Brower is hosting a town hall on Feb. 2 to discuss ICE activities and operations in Milwaukee. That meeting will be held at The Vivarium, 1818 N. Farwell Ave., at 6:15 p.m. 

Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez, who is running for governor, said in a Jan. 12 statement that there had been credible reports of increased ICE activity in Wisconsin. She called on state and local officials to take immediate action to protect public safety and civil rights “by adopting strong protections and transparency standards governing federal immigration enforcement operating in Wisconsin.”

Resources for residents

Voces de la Frontera ICE Hotline: 1-800-427-0213

Forward Latino Toolkits in English and Spanish.

Previous Milwaukee NNS reporting on resources and answers to common questions concerning immigration enforcement and constitutional rights.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Immigrant advocates urge preparation for possible ICE surge in Wisconsin is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

States with weak gun laws, including Wisconsin, experience more firearm deaths among children ages 0 to 17, according to a study published in the June issue of JAMA Pediatrics. 

“We cannot accept that harsh reality as normal,” said Nick Matuszewski, associate executive director at WAVE Educational Fund, a statewide grassroots organization dedicated to preventing gun violence. “This study provides dramatic evidence that when lawmakers step up and take action, they can save young lives.”

The study, authored by national public health researchers using data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, found that in Wisconsin, which was categorized as one of 28 states with the most permissive gun laws, child firearm deaths increased by 15%. The most affected group nationally was African American children. 

The study examined a period of time before and after a 2010 Supreme Court ruling that expanded local and state control over firearms laws. 

After that ruling, many states enacted new and more permissive firearm laws, according to the report.  The study looked at all types of firearm deaths, including suicides, homicides and unintentional shootings. 

In 2015, Wisconsin ended its 48-hour waiting period to purchase firearms, said Tyler Kelly, policy and engagement senior associate at WAVE. 

Kelly said many neighboring states and others across the country have strengthened their laws on background checks. 

“In Wisconsin, we have no red flag law, weak storage laws and a lack of a waiting period for buying a firearm,” Kelly said. “All have been shown to save lives.” 

Reaction from state leaders

State Sen. LaTonya Johnson, D-Milwaukee, said the findings of the study are no surprise to anyone who lives in Milwaukee. 

“We see the consequences of this inaction in every child that dies and every family that grieves,” Johnson said. “Most of the kids killed by gun violence in Wisconsin come from right here in our city.” 

New Milwaukee Public Schools Superintendent Brenda Cassellius said during a recent interview that 24 students in the district were victims of homicide this school year. Most were shot. 

New legislation, same old story

Johnson is among a group of Democratic elected officials who are pushing their Republican counterparts to move forward the Safe Summer package of legislation that would revamp the state’s gun laws. 

“I’m always hopeful, but if I’m being realistic, over and over again, Republican leadership has refused to debate common-sense gun safety proposals,” Johnson said. “Even a hearing would be a step forward at this point. I don’t believe that’s too much to ask.”

Championing the legislation is Democratic State Rep. Shelia Stubbs of Madison. She experienced a mass shooting at a school in her district in December 2024. 

“That day was a really difficult day for me. As a parent, I cried,” she said. “I don’t know how many more people must die from gun violence in the state of Wisconsin.” 

The Safe Summer package includes four bills. They would reinstitute the 48-hour waiting period to purchase a firearm; create an extreme-risk protection order, also known as a red flag law; ban ghost guns; and institute universal background checks for all firearm purchases. 

“We need better gun laws to keep guns out of the wrong hands,” Stubbs said. 

Gov. Tony Evers included similar measures in his last budget request, but they were removed by Republican lawmakers on the Joint Committee on Finance. 

NNS reached out to several Republican elected officials from Wisconsin for comment, but they did not respond. 

Republican leaders in Wisconsin and Second Amendment advocates have said over the years that gun violence is tied to a lack of accountability for criminals and not gun ownership. 

Stubbs and others disagree. She said the Republicans in Wisconsin refuse to discuss gun control legislation. 

‘We need better gun laws’

“We need better gun laws to keep guns out of the wrong hands,” she said. “It’s important to talk about the gun safety legislation to regulate access to firearms and promote responsible gun ownership.” 

Kelly said polls have found that the majority of Wisconsinites support stronger gun laws, including universal background checks and waiting periods to purchase guns. 

“If you’re using the gun for the right reasons, you shouldn’t have a problem waiting two days for it. “People in crisis shouldn’t be able to get a gun at the snap of their hands.” 

Stubbs said another major issue that the legislation would resolve is closing a loophole that allows private sales of firearms without background checks. 

“Those are transactions that do not get vetted,” she said. 

A universal issue

While proposed gun laws often become a partisan issue in Wisconsin and around the country, Stubbs hopes that changes. 

She said Democrats are looking for a Republican co-sponsor for the bills, calling gun violence a universal issue that affects everyone. 

“At the end of the day, many of my colleagues are parents. They have loved ones. Gun violence has impacted all of us in one way or another,” Stubbs said. 

Her hope is that something gets done before the next tragedy. 

“I hope it doesn’t take something more to happen before we do something,” she said. “We want everyone to have a safe summer. Enough is enough.” 

New study ties weak state gun laws to child deaths in Wisconsin is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

As she sits on her living room sofa surrounded by a large cutout, framed photos and a houseful of other reminders of her son Javon, Andrea Wilson, 41, can’t help but lose hope that her son’s murder will ever be solved. 

“Nobody’s ever going to be held accountable,” she said. “It just feels like no one is going to be held responsible for his murder.” 

It’s been nearly a year since she’s heard from Milwaukee homicide detectives and more than 16 months since Javon, 21, was hanging out with a group of friends when someone opened fire on them. They took him to St. Joseph’s hospital, where he died from a gunshot wound to his stomach. 

Losing her firstborn is bad enough, she said, but not having justice makes it harder.  Wilson is not alone in her struggles. In Milwaukee, hundreds of families share the unenviable bond of having a loved one murdered, with no one held responsible for it. 

Unsolved murders in Milwaukee

From 2020 to 2024, 901 homicides occurred in the city of Milwaukee. Over 350 of those murders remain unsolved, based on homicide clearance data provided by the Milwaukee Police Department. 

The homicide clearance rate refers to the percentage of cases cleared through arrest or because an arrest is impossible because of certain circumstances such as death, divided by the total number of homicides. Clearance rates also factor in murders solved during a calendar year for incidents that occurred in prior years. 

The clearance rate in Milwaukee fluctuated between 50% and 59% from 2020 to 2023. The year Javon was murdered, in 2023, 59% of 172 murders were cleared. 

Last year, when homicides dropped in the city by 30%, the clearance rate rose to 78%. Unsurprisingly, the clearance rate was lowest during the peak of the COVID pandemic when the number of homicides exploded in Milwaukee. 

Javon’s story

Javon was a fast talker and good kid who excelled at wrestling and other sports in school. He was also extremely bright, graduating from West Allis Central High School with a 3.9 GPA. Offered two college scholarships, he chose instead to attend MATC and pursue his dreams of being a rapper and entrepreneur. 

The day he got shot began like any other. He went to play basketball, came home to shower, and he let his mother know that he was heading out again. 

Then there was a knock at the door, and she learned Javon had been shot and was in the hospital. 

As she arrived, she asked about his condition. 

All the hospital staff would tell her, she said, is that they were waiting for detectives to arrive. 

“I should have realized then that he was already dead,” Wilson said. 

Wilson said her son wasn’t the intended victim but got caught up in someone else’s beef. 

After he died, she said, she called detectives for two weeks straight, even providing the names of potential suspects. 

“It didn’t matter. They called it hearsay,” Wilson said. “I feel like I know who murdered my son.”  

MPD stated that it continues to seek suspects in Javon’s homicide. 

‘There’s no stopping them’

Janice Gorden, who founded the organization Victims of Milwaukee Violence Burial Fund 10 years ago, said it’s common for mothers to conduct their own investigations in their loved one’s murder. 

“Sometimes they have way more information than the detectives do,” she said. 

Sadly, she said, many become consumed with trying to solve the murder themselves. 

“They drive themselves crazy trying to find answers to who killed their loved one,” she said. “I try to help but I can’t. I just listen to people like that because there’s no helping them. There’s no stopping them.” 

Since Javon’s death, Wilson said she’s gone through thousands of emotions, one of them being severe depression. Her mother, who helped raise Javon, her first grandson, is equally devastated. Javon also had a special bond with his little brother Shamus, who’s 8 years old. 

Shamus keeps a large cutout of Javon’s high school graduation photo in his bedroom and even grew out his hair to mimic his brother’s dreadlock hairstyle. Wilson said Shamus has struggled with anger issues since his big brother was killed.

“He doesn’t know how to adjust his emotions,” she said. “It’s been a very downward spiral for all of us.” 

‘I never knew it would happen to me’

Like Wilson, Brenda Hines knows the pain of losing a son to gun violence. 

Her middle child, Donovan, 23, was shot and killed while driving a car near North 29th Street and West Hampton Avenue in 2017. His case also remains unsolved. 

Hines said Donovan was never afraid to travel somewhere new without a plan other than to make it. She said she isn’t sure whether her son was killed in an ongoing dispute over a car or whether it stemmed from a woman. 

“I know there were people at the funeral home and at his vigil who knew,” she said. 

Hines has worked as a Salvation Army chaplain since 2014, heading to crime scenes to help other families deal with tragic incidents such as murders. 

“I never knew it would happen to me,” she said. 

Since Donovan’s death, she’s turned her pain into action, opening the Donovan Hines Foundation of Exuberance to honor her son and to help other families by providing mental health, grief counseling and other support. 

She also hosts an annual vigil to honor homicide victims in Milwaukee, part of a national series of events. Many of the families she’s met along the way are also waiting for justice for their loved one’s murders. 

“It really tears the family apart,” she said. “It’s like an open wound that is still bleeding. The tears flow every day.” 

Hines says she can’t tell families she knows exactly how they feel. 

“Every situation is different. But, I can tell them I understand,” she said. 

Solving murders

James Hutchinson, captain of the Milwaukee Police Department’s Homicide Division, said his team of 33 detectives remains committed to solving a case even as the days grow into years. 

“If someone comes in and says we have info on something that happened five years ago, we’ll take that info and follow up,” he said. “From the first two weeks, to a month, or months or years down the line, we’re equally as committed to solving a murder as we were today.” 

Many families, such as those of Hines’ and Wilson’s, question whether every stone gets turned in an investigation. 

“I don’t know if they did their due diligence,” Wilson said. “I don’t know if they care.” 

Hines, who has worked closely with officers during her time as a chaplain, said she respects the challenges police officers face.   

“They don’t have enough evidence,” she said.

Still, she can’t help but feel that more could have and should be done. 

“I’ve met personally with detectives because they won’t call back,” she said. “It’s a bad process.” 

Though it may not be much solace to the hundreds of families in Milwaukee still hoping for justice, Hutchinson said he and the detectives in his unit take each case personally. They know that the victim’s family and friends are devastated by their loved one’s murder. 

“It’s heartbreaking,” he said. “Making a death notification is one of the hardest parts of this job.” 

Hutchinson said resources in his department were spread thin when murders exploded in the city during the pandemic, which increased the challenge of building a case. 

The biggest challenge, though, he said, is that witness cooperation isn’t what it used to be. 

“It’s changed for the worse,” Hutchinson said. “There wasn’t a no snitching campaign back then.”

Wilson admits that witnesses to her son’s murder were reluctant to talk to police. She tracked down suspects on her own and offered those names to officers. That wasn’t enough to warrant charges, police told her. She needed her son’s friends to step up. 

“At this point y’all should tell what happened,” she told them. “Somebody needs to be held responsible.” 

How Milwaukee compares nationally

Thomas Hargrove, founder of the Murder Accountability Project, the largest database of unsolved murders in America, said Milwaukee homicide clearance rates are similar to what he saw nationally, especially during the pandemic. 

Many cities have struggled to solve murders since then. Part of the challenge is resources. 

“When you have enough resources, good things happen. When you don’t, bad things happen,” Hargrove said. “When you have over 200 murders, your system is off.” 

He also said it’s also much harder to get a conviction now than it was 20 years ago, which can create friction between the district attorney’s office and local police. 

Although police might make an arrest in a homicide case, that doesn’t mean that charges will be filed. 

Police, Hutchinson said, only need probable cause to make an arrest. The burden of proof at the district attorney’s office, which files homicide charges, is higher. 

“They have to be able to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt,” he said. “Many times we will make an arrest for probable cause, but we can’t get to that level.”

What often happens, Hutchinson said, is that officers will bring a case to the DA’s office or discuss what evidence they have and then have a dialogue about whether more is needed to file charges. 

While that can bring some frustration, admits Hutchinson, it is better than arresting the wrong person. 

“My worst nightmare I would have in the world is to have the wrong person held accountable for a crime,” he said. 

Milwaukee County District Attorney Kent Lovern acknowledges that the work to hold someone accountable for murder can be burdensome on families seeking justice. 

“Obviously there is a significant gap between the evidence needed to make an arrest versus the evidence needed to successfully prosecute a case,” Lovern said. 

The reason for caution and continued dialogue with officers in hopes of building a strong case is because there’s no room for error. 

“We really have one opportunity with a particular suspect to bring forward charges, and we want to get it right. Not only for the person charged, but the victim’s family and the integrity of the system,” he said. 

Regardless, said Hargrove, the more murders that remain unsolved, the worse it is for everyone. 

“The more murders you clear, the more murderers you get off the street, the more the murder rate will go down,” he said. 

Trying to move on

As Hines reflects on the ripple effect her son’s murder has had on her family, she does the only thing she can to maintain hope. 

“I have to have the peace of God,” she said. “He has taken care of the situation. I still get angry but I have to let God take control.” 

Meanwhile, Wilson, who still talks to Javon’s friends regularly, visits his grave monthly, and she threw him a huge birthday bash in May.

She wonders whether it’s time to put away some of his photos. Among them are large poster boards filled with pictures that were on display during Javon’s funeral. 

“I have to admit it is kind of depressing,” she said. “But it makes me feel like he’s still here with me.” 

For more information

Anyone with any information about murders is asked to contact Milwaukee police at (414) 935-7360. If you wish to remain anonymous, contact Crime Stoppers at (414) 224-TIPS (8477). 

Hargrove urges families of those whose murders have not been solved to request a formal review under the Homicide Victims’ Families’ Right Act. 

It allows for an individual to request federal agencies conduct a review of a homicide case investigation to determine whether it warrants a reinvestigation. 

‘Nobody’s ever going to be held accountable’: Families of unsolved murder victims in Milwaukee fight to maintain hope  is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

As they hit the streets, members of 414LIFE, a community and hospital-based violence intervention program, know their efforts could literally mean the difference between life and death. 

That theory was put to the test recently when 414LIFE members showed up to diffuse a neighborhood dispute that also involved law enforcement officers on Milwaukee’s North Side. If not for that intervention, Lynn Lewis, executive director of 414LIFE, believes the incident could have ended in tragedy. 

“Frontline workers go into situations where emotions are high, where people are riled up and thinking about retaliation,” Lewis said. 

As temperature rises, so can violence

Lewis said her 414LIFE team of 15 violence interrupters and outreach workers has hit the streets hard in recent weeks, responding to an uptick in violence. 

“There have been about seven shootings and four homicides in the last 72 hours,” Lewis said during a community pop-up recently near Milwaukee Fire Station 5 on the North Side. 

Reggie Moore is the director of violence prevention policy and engagement at the Comprehensive Injury Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin, which implements the program for the city of Milwaukee.

He said shootings over the past three weeks have kept the 414LIFE team busy. 

Many of the shootings, he said, involved interfamily conflict or intimate partner violence. And while the violence typically rises with the temperature, Moore said, it’s the sheer volume of guns on the streets that presents the biggest problem. 

“The presence of a firearm increases the risk of arguments or conflicts resulting in serious injuries or death,” he said. “People are losing their lives and freedom over a moment of anger. 

“Our team along with our partners have been working around the clock responding to scenes and hospitals to support impacted families and neighborhoods.” 

‘Life is bigger than just the hood’

Lewis said the group held several pop-ups recently along with staff from Credible Messengers, a Milwaukee County violence intervention program. One was at Tiefenthaler Park, 2501 W. Galena St., where a shooting occurred after a vigil recently. 

“We talk to people in hot spots like that about the need to change up before they end up incarcerated or dead,” Lewis said. “We need to stop the bleeding.” 

The interrupters are well versed in the street lifestyle, having lived through the same challenges that people in the community face now. 

One message they share, whether it’s with youths or adults, Lewis said, “is that life is bigger than just the hood.” 

They talk about goals and share resources such as information on jobs, food and other programs to help the people they serve build social capital and eventually change their attitudes toward gun violence, she said. 

“Milwaukee, we need to stop shooting and start healing,” Lewis said. 

Community violence intervention programs like 414 LIFE take a public health approach to reducing violence and improving community safety, Moore said.

He said the 414LIFE program, which was inspired by the Blueprint for Peace, is the longest community violence intervention program in Milwaukee. 

In addition to a street team, 414LIFE also has a hospital-based component that offers services to victims of gun violence.  

“Our colleagues at Froedtert Hospital are also feeling the weight of these shootings just as much as our street teams on the front line,” Moore said. “Working in the streets and hospitals, 414LIFE has been engaging with families and others impacted by shootings across the city.” 

The 414LIFE community team was involved in 49 conflict mediations in 2024, with nearly 90% being resolved, Moore said during a May 22 presentation on the program to the Common Council’s Public Safety and Health Committee. 

The team spent 1,388 hours on conflict resolution activities and 2,678 hours on behavior and community norm change activities and worked with 25 youths in 2024. 

Aside from mediations, team members also have active caseloads of individuals referred to them by hospitals, the Office of Community Wellness and Safety and individuals they’ve met during outreach. 

Data from 414LIFE’s April monthly report shows that caseloads have increased recently, from 36 in January to 50 in April. The team has logged more than 1,200 hours so far this year on behavior change and public accompaniment efforts and more than 100 hours on direct violence intervention. 

Evidence of the program’s effectiveness, according to Moore, is that last year’s 414LIFE priority neighborhood, Old North Milwaukee, experienced a 31% decrease in homicides and a 6% decrease in nonfatal shootings in 2024, based on data from the Milwaukee Police Department. 

So far this year, homicides are down 50% and nonfatal shootings 43% in Old North Milwaukee. 

During his presentation to the Public Safety and Health Committee, Moore said each homicide in Milwaukee costs the city more than $2 million in hospital, criminal investigation, incarceration and other costs, while each shooting costs the city over half a million dollars. 

Who are 414LIFE members? 

While lived experience helps 414LIFE’s street team talk the talk and walk the walk, it’s the extensive training the members receive that gives them the tools to walk into a volatile situation to prevent bloodshed. 

Lewis said her team operates under the Cure Violence model, which works to reduce the risk of retaliation, revictimization and other community violence through credible messengers.  

To strengthen those skills, each member goes through the Academy for Transformational Change training, which uses a community asset approach to serve neighborhoods most impacted by crime and incarceration. 

Members also receive shooting response, Narcan, Stop the Bleed, Mental Health First Aid and other training, she said. 

“The team is highly trained,” Lewis said. “They also have passion and grit.” 

Challenges for violence interruption programs

While violence interruption efforts continue in Milwaukee, funding cuts, particularly at the federal level, threaten the future of violence prevention programming. 

According to a report by the Council on Criminal Justice, the Trump administration has cut federal funding for community safety and violence intervention programming by more than $168 million. 

“This work is under attack,” said David Muhammad, deputy director of the Department of Health and Human Services for Milwaukee County, during a pop-up event. “We have to fight for the resources we have.” 

In addition to 414LIFE and other local community violence intervention programs, a key to help maintain the reduction of violence that Milwaukee has experienced over the past two years is residents, Moore said.  

“Peace starts with the people, and we must ensure that firearms are securely stored and not accessible to individuals prohibited from having them,” he said. 

414LIFE: Milwaukee street intervention team seeks to disrupt gun violence is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

When he leaves the office at the end of the week, James Hutchinson, captain of the Milwaukee Police Department’s Homicide Unit, can’t wait for Monday so he can get back to work solving murders.

“I could have retired six months ago,” he said. “But I know that the work we do really makes an impact on people’s lives.”

That work doesn’t always go as planned. Last year Milwaukee homicide detectives cleared 78% of the 132 murder cases they investigated — the highest rate in years. From 2020 to 2023, when murder rates soared during the pandemic, clearance rates fluctuated between 50% and 59%, leaving many families without closure.

For those awaiting justice, Hutchinson said he wants them to know that his team of 33 investigators remains committed to solving their case.

“From the first two weeks to a month, or months or years down the line, we’re equally as committed to solving a murder as we were today.”

That work begins as soon as a homicide is reported, he said.

Homicide investigations in Milwaukee

Typically, said Hutchinson, uniformed officers are the first to arrive on the scene. They work to establish an incident command area, set parameters using police tape, control crowds and prevent any disruption of evidence.

Patrol officers are also the first to seek out witnesses and spot cameras.

Detectives are not far behind. As soon as a homicide is reported, Hutchinson said, a team of detectives and supervisors will immediately head to the scene and start their investigation.

Once they arrive, they assemble the information that’s already been collected, gather more clues, find additional witnesses and hopefully identify suspects. Investigations take place in homes, city streets and hospitals or even at the medical examiner’s office.

Critical, Hutchinson said, is the early stages of that investigation.

“Those first moments, those first hours, those first minutes are very important. Evidence starts to disappear. People go to different places. It could be as simple as video evidence being recorded over. We focus and attack an investigation very fast, very intensively,” he said.

When homicides happen in bunches, as was often the case during the pandemic, resources are pulled from other units to help.

The team approach

Hutchinson said MPD investigates homicides differently from any other large city in America, using a team approach rather than dedicating detectives to specific cases. Homicide investigators working that shift will begin the investigation and then debrief the next shift before handing off the case.

“They brief the incoming shift on what occurred, what was accomplished and what still needs to be done,” Hutchinson said. “That cycle continues until we run out of things we need to do right now.”

Utilizing this method allows for a continuous investigation, but it also creates some problems, acknowledges Hutchinson.

“Because there is this team concept, you have a potential for having not as much accountability per person,” he said. 

He said his division works to alleviate that problem by relying on sergeants and others, including himself, to oversee investigations and follow-ups.

Communication challenges

Another issue with not dedicating specific investigators to specific cases is communication.

“We love to get information, but we are not good at checking back in with the family and letting them know we haven’t forgotten,” he said. “We acknowledge that we have room for improvement.”

Not receiving regular updates from homicide investigators is a common complaint among family members of victims, especially those whose cases remain unsolved.

Brenda Hines, whose son Donovan was murdered in 2017, tracked down officers in person when they wouldn’t respond to her calls. 

“It’s a bad process,” she said. 

She founded the Donovan Hines Foundation in honor of her son and to help other families by providing grief support, mental health and other resources to residents. 

Hines said she believes police can still solve her son’s murder if anything should come up.

“They just don’t have enough evidence yet,” she said.

Janice Gorden, who created Victims of Milwaukee Violence to help families access funeral support and other services, said she believes police are doing what they can to solve homicides and work with families.

But families, she said, will not be satisfied until they have answers. Often it gets to the point where they become focused on investigating the case themselves.

“They have way more information than sometimes the detectives do,” Gorden said. “They drive themselves crazy trying to find answers to who killed their loved one.”

Both Hines and Gorden have worked with mothers to arrange meetings with police and the district attorney’s office to get information about homicide cases.

Hutchinson said two new victim support positions were created recently to help improve communication with families.

Notifying the family

Hutchinson worked his way up the ranks of MPD, first as a patrol officer, then gang squad, detective, robbery and vice squad, and as a homicide detective from 2008 to 2020.

Before becoming captain, he has often taken on the grim task of letting a family member know a loved one was killed.

“Making a death notification is one of the hardest parts of this job. It’s incredibly heartbreaking,” he said. “The range of reactions, you can’t even anticipate. There are completely stoic people that accept what you’re telling them, to some incredibly violent reactions.”

A much better feeling, he said, is when they are able to notify a family that an arrest has been made. But even that’s a struggle.

From investigation to charges

Although police might make an arrest in a homicide case, that doesn’t mean that charges will be filed.

Police, Hutchinson said, only need probable cause to make an arrest. The burden of proof at the district attorney’s office, which files homicide charges, is higher.

“The DA’s office has to be able to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt,” he said. “Many times we will make an arrest for probable cause, but we can’t get to that level.”

What often happens, Hutchinson said, is that officers will bring a case to the DA’s office or discuss what evidence they have and then talk about whether more is needed to file charges.

While that does bring some frustration, admits Hutchinson, it’s better than arresting the wrong person.

“My worst nightmare I would have in the world is to have the wrong person held accountable for a crime,” he said.

Milwaukee County District Attorney Kent Lovern acknowledges that the work to hold someone accountable for murder can be burdensome on families seeking justice.

“Obviously, there is a significant gap between the evidence needed to make an arrest versus the evidence needed to successfully prosecute a case,” Lovern said.

The reason for caution and continued dialogue with officers in hopes of building a strong case is because there’s no room for error.

“We really have one opportunity with a particular suspect to bring forward charges and we want to get it right. Not only for the person charged, but the victim’s family and the integrity of the system,” he said.

‘We never forget about the victims’

Depending on the time of year and other circumstances, homicide investigation units can get extremely busy, Hutchinson said. Even when pulling resources from other units, it can still impact the amount of time investigators have for each case.

On the flip side, he said, sometimes they’ve hit the point where they don’t have anything left to do at the moment. But, he said, he wants families to know that victims are more than just a name to them.

“They are someone’s family member or friend, and the day they died is probably the worst day of many people’s lives,” he said.

Whether it’s been days, months or years, he wants family members to know his unit remains committed to solving their murder.

“Everyone can be assured that we never forget about the victims,” he said. “There is no replacement for their loved one, but it feels great to be able to notify the family that we have made an arrest.”

How you can help

Anyone with information on homicides is asked to contact Milwaukee police at 414-935-7360, or to remain anonymous, contact Crime Stoppers at 414- 224-TIPS.

What happens when someone is murdered in Milwaukee? An inside look at homicide investigations is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

It appears that Milwaukee County is ready to work with the state to find a new community action agency to replace the Social Development Commission, the embattled agency that has provided anti-poverty services for more than 60 years.

In an email to NNS, a spokesperson from the press office of Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley stated: “Given the urgent need for supportive services in Milwaukee County, and in light of SDC’s ongoing challenges, we stand ready to work with the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families and other local partners to identify another eligible entity or entities who can receive (Community Services Block Grant) funds and provide needed services to county residents.”

The Social Development Commission, also known as the SDC, is eligible to receive these federal block grant funds administered by the state through its status as a community action agency, which the state is considering rescinding.

The email from the county was sent in response to a question about whether the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors and the Milwaukee Common Council are required by state law to approve any decision to rescind SDC’s designation as a community action agency.

The background

The Wisconsin Department of Children and Families, or DCF, is scheduled to make a final decision on SDC’s community action status in the coming months.

DCF held a public hearing on April 4 to discuss SDC’s designation and future. At the meeting, some SDC board members and current and former employees testified about the crucial need to maintain the agency.

The department’s leadership said SDC has not created a realistic financial plan to restart services and perform its community action duties under the law, and it continues to have financial, programmatic, operational and service delivery concerns.

SDC reopened in a limited capacity in December after abruptly shutting down in April 2024, when problems included failing to pay employees and contractors on time and using grant dollars for one program to cover costs for another.

The agency has since missed state deadlines to pay employees their owed wages and also still owes some contractors for completed work.

 In addition, SDC’s property corporation, SD Properties Inc., is facing a foreclosure lawsuit and owes nearly $3 million in mortgage payments on its North Avenue buildings, according to court records.

Who’s responsible?

Jorge Franco, interim CEO of SDC and chair of its board, said Wisconsin law requires both the Common Council and County Board of Supervisors to approve a decision to de-designate SDC as a community action agency before the state can take that action. 

Franco is referring to Wisconsin Statute 49.265, which states the following: “The approval of a community action agency may be rescinded but only if there is good cause and if the decision to rescind is made by both the legislative body of the county, city, village or town that granted the approval and the secretary.”

According to the organization’s former website, SDC became a community action agency in 1964, shortly after the Economic Opportunity Act created the Community Action Program.

Because SDC was established through a collaboration that involved the city, county and other organizations, there is a lack of clarity over which legislative body actually granted SDC’s approval as a community action agency.

It’s also unclear which legislative body must weigh in on the commission’s potential de-designation based on state statute.

According to a spokesperson from the Milwaukee County Executive’s Office, a review of records found that the county board and the city of Milwaukee enacted an ordinance establishing SDC as a commission, but not specifically as a community action agency. 

“We have not found any records indicating that the County Board ever took any action relative to SDC’s status as a CAA,” an email from the Milwaukee County Executive Press Office said.

Because the county board did not approve SDC’s status as a community action agency, it does not have the authority to rescind that status, the Milwaukee County Executive Press Office’s email said. 

Jeff Fleming, a spokesperson for Mayor Cavalier Johnson, said the city’s responsibility in the potential de-designation of SDC as a community action agency has been a topic of discussion.

“The first impression from the city side is that it was the county that ‘granted the approval,’” Fleming said in an email, referring to SDC’s status as a community action agency. 

NNS also reached out to Milwaukee City Attorney Evan Goyke for comment on the issue, but he hasn’t responded. 

The Department of Children and Families was also questioned about which legislative body granted SDC approval to be a community action agency. 

“This is the first time the Department of Children and Families has sought to de-designate a community action agency,” said Gina Paige, communications director for DCF.  “As such, we are working closely with the federal Office of Community Services and Milwaukee County to determine what the process would need to be should we move forward with de-designating SDC.”

According to Franco, the state operates under a federal mandate to provide the types of anti-poverty services that SDC had provided for decades.

He said without SDC, those services could be delayed by several years.

“The bottom line point is that infrastructure is there. It must be activated immediately,” Franco said. 

Money, Franco said, is needed to help the agency climb out of debt and, more importantly, relaunch vital services to low-income residents in the county.

“SDC intends to pay every dollar it owes. First things first. Get anti-poverty services ready to go through SDC, which is ready to go today and that should not be delayed any further,” Franco said.

Some elected officials weigh in. Most stay silent.

State Sen. LaTonya Johnson said that she’d like to see SDC rebound from its troubles.

“SDC has been in the community for many years providing pivotal services for the community and this community can’t afford to lose those services,” she said.

Still, she said, given the significant mismanagement of funds at SDC, she understands that the Department of Children and Families will make a decision it feels is in the best interests of residents.

“Whatever decision they make, I’ll have to back it just like other elected officials will because we have to believe that they’re making the choice that’s best for taxpayers,” she said. “I’m hoping that the state will have a way to make sure that services will be provided, whether it’s SDC or not.”

Ald. Sharlen Moore also hopes to see SDC survive.

“They provide a critical need to our community, and so what I would hope is that they would find the necessary help or support that they need in order to get back on track,” Moore said. “It’s such a huge void.”

Like Johnson, she also acknowledges the challenges of providing funding to an organization with an uncertain future.

“It’s hard giving someone money without knowing how they are going to move forward,” she said.

Rep. Gwen Moore said it is important to center the people who have been majorly affected, like residents who lost services and former employees who are still owed pay.

“The serious concerns raised by the state must be addressed, and I hope the result of this process moves us closer to resuming these vital services to my constituents,” she said.

NNS reached out to more than 20 elected officials from the city, county and state government for comment on SDC’s future, including Common Council President Jose Perez and Milwaukee County Board Chairwoman Marcella Nicholson. Only three elected officials chose to speak.

What’s next?  

Despite the current challenges, Franco said that he is confident SDC will bounce back and that the history of the organization is proof of its effectiveness in fighting poverty.

“SDC has a legacy of generations of people who’ve been helped by SDC, and they still live in the community,” he said. “Whatever its issues were in recent times, the long-standing legacy and the number of people who have been helped must not be forgotten.”

Milwaukee County appears ready to find replacement for Social Development Commission is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

As both a survivor and advocate on the issue, Natalie Hayden knows how guns can turn a domestic violence situation from dangerous to deadly.

“Having that weapon just really elevates things and makes it more lethal for both parties involved,” said Hayden, co-founder of ExPOSED Inc., a nonprofit that works to empower youths and foster healthy relationships.

They’re the type of tragedies, ones that involve guns in the hands of domestic abusers, that lawmakers hope to help prevent in the future. The plan is to reintroduce legislation this year to keep individuals convicted of domestic violence offenses from possessing firearms in Wisconsin.

State Sen. Kelda Roys, D-Madison, who co-authored similar legislation that failed to pass last year, said the goal is to align Wisconsin law with a federal law that keeps guns out of the hands of convicted domestic offenders.

If passed this go-round, the legislation would change the state’s disorderly conduct statute to separate violent conduct from other types of disorderly conduct.

 It also would alter the statute defining domestic abuse so that court records indicate the exact nature of the relationship between those involved. Together, they would close the loophole that allows domestic violence offenders in Wisconsin from possessing guns.

Impact of firearms on domestic violence situations

Jenna Gormal, public policy director for End Domestic Abuse Wisconsin, said that women are five times more likely to be killed when an abuser has access to a gun and that domestic violence assaults involving a gun are 12 times more likely to result in death.

Firearms were used in 66 of 85 domestic violence homicides in Wisconsin in 2023, Gormal said.

The highest number, 28, occurred in Milwaukee County, according to the End Domestic Abuse Wisconsin Homicide Report 2023.

Domestic-violence-related charges are often present before a domestic violence homicide occurs, Gormal said.

“That tells us that people that are convicted of domestic violence offenses are more likely to commit homicide,” she said.

Hayden said guns create a high-risk situation for everyone involved in a domestic violence situation. Sometimes, she said, victims will purchase their own firearm to protect themselves from an abuser who also has one.

Guns also create a situation that is harder for a victim to escape from, she said.

“There is a weapon involved and I don’t feel safe, but maybe I have to stick around for the safety of my kids,” Hayden said.

Having a firearm present also can result in an abuser making a fatal decision once his partner decides to leave, she said.

“People can resort to extreme violence once they feel like they’ve lost that control,” Hayden said.

Some support for change

Gov. Tony Evers said keeping firearms from domestic abusers was a priority of his administration during his State of the State address in January. The city of Milwaukee passed a resolution in late 2023 in support of a change in state law that prevents domestic abusers from possessing guns.

Gormal said that legislation preventing domestic abusers from possessing firearms is a common sense, not a partisan, issue.

Roys said it’s an issue that everyone should care about but blames the gun lobby and Republican leaders for prioritizing politics over the safety of victims.

“The public overwhelmingly wants gun safety laws much broader than we have right now,” she said. “My hope is that they will finally start to prioritize women and kids who are being victimized.”

NNS reached out to Rep. Bob Donovan, a former Milwaukee alderman who now represents Greenfield in the state Assembly, and Rep. Jessie Rodriguez, both Republicans, for comment on the legislation. Neither responded.

Corey Graff, executive director of Wisconsin Gun Owners Inc., a gun rights organization, said the type of legislation Roys and others are pushing for would only impact law-abiding gun owners.

“Someone who is interested in committing an assault and potential murder against the victim is not going to follow any firearms laws,” Graff said. “Across the board, this is a homogenous attack on liberty and doesn’t address the crime of domestic violence.”

Graff said the legislation would also create a false sense of security for victims.

“They might assume that their attacker will follow the law, but that’s a false premise,” he said.

Tips for survivors

All situations are different, Hayden said, and women ultimately must decide for themselves what is best for them and their family. But there are some strategic things they can do to help them be safer, she said.

“Let people know of your whereabouts. Bring people into the fold that you trust,” Hayden said.

Sometimes, she said, victims are not ready or even able to leave because of certain circumstances, but they can start thinking of a plan while they wait.

“You can look for a shelter, and if something happens, you can file the necessary paperwork,” she said. “It’s always good to document what happens if you get to the other side and it gets to the courts.”

Overall, she said, the system needs to improve if we are going to protect people from being victimized by domestic violence.

“We need the nets to be there to catch us when we are ready. We need to bring awareness to our young people so that they can be safe, and we need to keep guns from people who could use them to bring harm,” Hayden said.

Latest push begins to prevent domestic abusers in Wisconsin from possessing firearms is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Unless things change soon, it appears unlikely that the city of Milwaukee and Milwaukee Public Schools will meet the Feb. 17 deadline to place at least 25 student resource officers in schools.

Wisconsin Act 12, a law enacted in summer 2023, mandated that police officers be placed in MPS and stipulated that they must first complete 40 hours of training through the National Association of School Resource Officers.

This has yet to happen.

A school resource officer is a law enforcement officer who works full time in collaboration with a school district, according to Act 12.

School resource officers typically carry firearms, according to the National Association of School Resource Officers.

No trainings scheduled

Mo Canady, executive director of the National Association of School Resource Officers, said no Milwaukee Police Department officers have completed or are scheduled to take the weeklong training before Feb. 17. 

“We are never going to recommend that an officer start working in a school without first being put through this training,” Canady said. “We’re talking about the most unique assignment in law enforcement: putting men and women in schools and trusting them to do good work with adolescents in the school environment.”

MPD did not confirm its timeline for training or whether it has enough officers who have completed the training in the past.

Even if there were officers with past training, though, that wouldn’t necessarily be the best or safest option, Canady said.

“We don’t have a timeline on when you should retake the training,” but “there have been massive changes” in the past five years, Canady said. 

Subjects that have been updated or added include training on how adolescent brains develop, forms of bias and how to understand trauma, he said.

A spokesperson for MPD deferred all questions to the City Attorney’s Office, stating the department is “unaware of the status of the agreement.”

Several attempts to speak with the City Attorney’s Office were unsuccessful as were attempts to speak with every member of the Milwaukee Board of School Directors except one. 

Training is the most important concern when it comes to officers in schools for Henry Leonard, Milwaukee Public Schools board director of District 7.

Without this training, Leonard said he fears “a haphazard approach to this and it turns into a disaster.”

Next steps

There are no consequences for having not met the 2024 deadline stipulated by Act 12, according to an analyst with the Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau, a nonpartisan agency that provides research and legal services to lawmakers.

An additional hearing has been scheduled if the Feb. 17 deadline is not met.

Jeff Fleming, a spokesman for Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson, said there have been some productive meetings between the city and MPS.

“The Mayor is optimistic the outstanding issues can be resolved,” he wrote in an email to NNS.

How we got here

In 2016, MPS pulled officers from inside its schools and, four years later, ended a contract with MPD for patrols outside its buildings.

Act 12 required the city to beef up its police force by 2034 and ordered officers back into MPS by Jan. 1, 2024. That deadline came and passed as the school district and city jostled over who would pay the estimated $2 million cost to fund the officers. 

Pressure to bring officers back into schools picked up after a mother of an MPS student who was bullied sued the city and school district for not meeting Act 12 requirements.

Milwaukee County Circuit Court Judge David Borowski decided in favor of the mother, ruling that the city of Milwaukee and MPS are responsible for getting officers in schools by Feb. 17.

Impact on current officer shortage

NNS reported in December about hiring challenges within MPD as the number of new recruits wasn’t enough to offset the retirement and departure of other officers or potentially the new requirements of Act 12.

Leon Todd, executive director of the Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission, said officers placed at MPS would come from the current ranks of the MPD, which could stretch the department’s already thin ranks.

“One of our top priorities is to grow the size of MPD, and we obviously want to limit the strain,” Todd said. “While these officers would be placed in MPS and wouldn’t be available to take other calls for service, the number of calls are going to be reduced as they won’t need to respond because they will already have officers in schools.”

According to a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article, there were 40,643 calls to police from MPS-associated addresses from 2013 to 2024, although 7% of those calls were during nighttime hours.

The Fire and Police Commission is typically in charge of hiring all new officers. But because the school resource officers are going to be current officers, Todd said, the police chief or the department’s executive command staff will decide who is sent into schools. 

Canady emphasized the importance of carefully selecting those officers.

“There should be input from the school community,” Canady said. “These should be officers who are veterans, who have been with the department at least three years, so we know something about their character. They should be officers who have shown sincere interest in working with youth.” 

Leaders Igniting Transformation, a youth-led nonprofit in Milwaukee, doesn’t want officers back in schools at all. 

“We are angry and terrified at the thought of placing armed police officers back in Milwaukee classrooms, who have shown time and time again that they are unfit to work with students and have no place in our schools,” a recent statement from the group said.

News414 is a service journalism collaboration between Wisconsin Watch and Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service that addresses the specific issues, interests, perspectives and information needs identified by residents of central city Milwaukee neighborhoods. Learn more at our website or sign up for our texting service here.

Will police officers be placed in Milwaukee public schools before Feb. 17 deadline? Not likely is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

In many ways, Hamid Abd-Al-Jabbar’s life story involved redemption. A victim of abuse who was exposed to alcohol and drugs while growing up on Milwaukee’s North Side, he made dangerous choices as a teenager. By age 19, he landed in prison after shooting and killing a man during a 1988 drug house robbery. 

But he worked on himself while incarcerated, his wife Desilynn Smith recalled. After he walked out of prison for good, he found a calling as a peace activist. He became a violence interrupter for Milwaukee’s 414 Life program, aiming to prevent gun violence through de-escalation and intervention. 

Abd-Al-Jabbar may have looked healed on the outside, but he never moved past the trauma that shaped much of his life, Smith said. He wouldn’t ask for help.

That’s why Smith still grieves. Her husband died in February 2021 after ingesting a drug mixture that included fentanyl and cocaine. He was 51.

Smith now wears his fingerprint on a charm bracelet as a physical reminder of the man she knew and loved for most of her life.

“He never learned how to cope with things in a healthy way,” said Smith, executive director of Uniting Garden Homes, Inc., an organization that provides mental health and substance use services on Milwaukee’s North Side. “In our communities addiction is frowned upon, so people don’t get the help they need.”

Abd-Al-Jabbar is part of a generation of Milwaukee’s older Black men who are disproportionately dying from drug poisonings and overdoses, even as the opioid epidemic slows for others.

Milwaukee County is among dozens of U.S. counties where drugs are disproportionately killing a generation of Black men, born between 1951 and 1970, an analysis by The Baltimore Banner, The New York Times and Stanford University’s Big Local News found. Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service and Wisconsin Watch are collaborating with them and eight other newsrooms to examine this pattern.

Times and Banner reporters initially identified the pattern in Baltimore. They later found the same effect in dozens of counties nationwide.

In Milwaukee, Black men of the generation accounted for 12.5% of all drug deaths between 2018 and 2022. That’s despite making up just 2.3% of the total population. 

The county’s older Black men were lost to drugs at rates 14.2 times higher than all people nationally and 5.5 times higher than all other Milwaukee County residents. 

Six other Wisconsin counties — Brown, Dane, Kenosha, Racine, Rock and Waukesha — ranked among the top 408 nationally in drug deaths during the years analyzed. But Milwaukee was the only one in Wisconsin where this generation of Black men died at such staggering rates.

Milwaukee trend accelerates

The trend in Milwaukee County has only accelerated since 2022, the last year of the Times and Banner analysis, even as the county’s total drug deaths decline, Milwaukee NNS and Wisconsin Watch found.

Drugs killed 74 of the county’s older Black men in 2024. The group made up 17.3% of all drug deaths  — up from 16.2% in 2023 and 14.1% the previous year, medical examiner data shows.

Abd-Al-Jabbar’s story shares similarities with many of those men. Most used cocaine that was cut with stronger fentanyl — the faster-acting drug has fueled the national opioid epidemic. Most had a history of incarceration. 

They lived in a state that imprisons Black men at one of the country’s highest rates. Wisconsin is also home to some of the country’s widest disparities in education, public health, housing and income. Milwaukee, its biggest city, helps drive those trends. 

Marc Levine, a University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee researcher, concluded in 2020 that “Black Milwaukee is generally worse off today than it was 40 or 50 years ago” when considering dozens of quality of life indicators.

Meanwhile, limited options and lingering stigma prevent a generation of Black men from accessing drug treatment, local experts told Milwaukee NNS and Wisconsin Watch.  

“Black men experience higher rates of community violence, are often untreated for mental health issues and experience greater levels of systemic racism than other groups,” said Lia Knox, a Milwaukee mental wellness consultant. “These all elevate their risk of incarceration, addiction and also death.” 

A network of organizations providing comprehensive treatment offers hope, but these resources fall far short of meeting community needs. 

A silent struggle 

Smith and Abd-Al-Jabbar first started dating at 14, and they had a child together at 16. But as their relationship blossomed, Smith said, Abd-Al-Jabbar silently struggled with what she suspects was an undiagnosed mental health illness linked to childhood trauma.

“A lot of the bad behaviors he had were learned behaviors,” Smith said. 

Abd-Al-Jabbar became suicidal as a teen and began robbing drug dealers. 

When he entered prison, Abd-Al-Jabbar read and wrote at a fifth grade level and coped like a 10-year-old, Smith said. By age 21, she said, he’d already spent two years in solitary confinement. But he had the resolve to change. He began to read voraciously and converted to Islam. 

He was released from prison after 11 years, but returned multiple times before leaving for good in 2018. Smith and Abd-Al-Jabbar married, and he started earning praise for preventing bloodshed as a violence interrupter. 

Still, he struggled under the pressures of his new calling. The work added weight to the trauma he carried into and out of prison. His mental health only worsened, Smith said, and he turned back to drugs as a coping mechanism.   

“The main thing he learned in prison was how to survive,” she said. 

Most men lost were formerly incarcerated

At least half of Milwaukee’s older Black men lost to drugs in 2024 served time in state prison, Milwaukee NNS and Wisconsin Watch found by cross-referencing Department of Corrections and medical examiner records. More than a dozen other men on that list interacted with the criminal justice system in some way. Some served time in jail. For others, full records weren’t available.

Most of the men left prison decades or years before they died. But three died within about a year of their release. A 55-year-old North Side man died just 22 days after release. 

National studies have found high rates of substance use disorders among people who are incarcerated but low rates of treatment. Jails and prisons often fail to meet the demands for such services. 

In Wisconsin, DOC officials and prisoners say drugs are routinely entering prisons, putting prisoners and staff at risk and increasing challenges for people facing addiction. 

Thousands wait for treatment in prison

The DOC as of last December enrolled 815 people in substance abuse treatment programs, but its waitlist for such services was far higher: more than 11,700.   

“You don’t really get the treatment you need in prison,” said Randy Mack, a 66-year-old Black man who served time in Wisconsin’s Columbia, Fox Lake, Green Bay and Kettle Moraine correctional institutions.

Leaving prison can be a particularly vulnerable time for relapse, Mack said. Some men manage to stop using drugs while incarcerated. They think they are safe, only to struggle when they leave. 

“You get back out on the streets and you see the same people and fall into the same traps,” Mack said. 

Knox, the wellness consultant, agrees. After being disconnected from their communities, many men, especially older ones, leave prison feeling isolated and unable to ask for help. They turn to drugs. 

“Now with the opioids, they’re overdosing and dying more often,” she said. 

For those who complete drug treatment in prison, the DOC offers a 12-month medicated-assisted treatment program to reduce the chances of drug overdoses. Those who qualify receive a first injection of the drug naltrexone shortly before their release from prison. They continue to receive monthly injections and therapy for a year. 

Access to the program is uneven across the state. Corrections officials have sought to expand it using settlement money from national opioids litigation. In its latest two-year budget request the department set a goal for hiring more vendors to administer the program. 

Democratic Gov. Tony Evers plans to release his full budget proposal next month. His past proposals have sought millions of dollars for treatment and other rehabilitation programs. The Republican-controlled Legislature has rejected or reduced funding in most cases.

Mack said he received some help while in prison, but it wasn’t intense enough to make a breakthrough. Now he’s getting more holistic treatment from Serenity Inns, a North Side recovery program for men. 

Executive Director Kenneth Ginlack said the organization helps men through up to 20 hours of mental health and substance use treatment each week. 

What’s key, Ginlack said, is that most of his staff, including himself, are in recovery. 

“We understand them not just from a recovery standpoint, but we were able to go back to our own experiences and talk to them about that,” he said. “That’s how we build trust in the community.” 

Fentanyl catches cocaine users unaware

Many of the older men dying were longtime users of stimulants, like crack cocaine, Ginlack said, adding they had “no idea that the stimulants are cut with fentanyl.”

They don’t feel the need to use test strips to check for fentanyl or carry Narcan to reverse the effects of opioid poisoning, he said. 

Last year, 84% of older Black men killed by drugs had cocaine in their system, and 61% had fentanyl, Milwaukee NNS and Wisconsin Watch found. More than half ingested both drugs. 

Months after relapsing, Alfred Carter, 61, decided he was ready to kick his cocaine habit. 

When he showed up to a Milwaukee detox center in October, he was shocked to learn he had fentanyl in his system. 

“What made it so bad is that I hear all the stories about people putting fentanyl in cocaine, but I said not my people,” Carter said. “It puts a healthy fear in my life, because at any time I can overdose — not even knowing that I’m taking it.” 

Awareness is slowly increasing, Ginlack said, as more men in his program share stories about losing loved ones.

Milwaukee’s need outpaces resources 

Expanding on its original outpatient treatment center on West Brown Street, Serenity Inns now also runs a residential treatment facility and a transitional living program and opened a drop-in clinic in January.

Still, those don’t come close to meeting demands for its services. 

“We’re the only treatment center in Milwaukee County that takes people without insurance, so a lot of other centers send people our way,” said Ginlack, who said the county typically runs about 200 beds short of meeting demand.

“My biggest fear is someone calls for that bed and the next day they have a fatal overdose because one wasn’t available.”  

‘I don’t want to lose hope’

Carter and Mack each intend to complete their programs soon. It’s Mack’s fourth time in treatment and his second stint at Serenity Inns. This time, he expects to succeed. He wants to move into Serenity Inns’ apartment building — continuing his recovery and working toward becoming a drug counselor. 

“My thinking pattern has changed,” Mack said. “I’m going to use the tools we learned in treatment and avoid high-risk situations.” 

Carter wants to restore his life to what it was before. He spent years as a carpenter before his life unraveled and he ended up in prison. He knows he can’t take that life back if he returns to drugs.

“I have to be able to say no and not get high. It doesn’t do me any good, and it could kill me,” he said. “I have to associate myself with being clean. I don’t want to lose hope.”

As Smith reflects on her partner’s life and death, she recognizes his journey taught her plenty, too.  “I was hit hard with the reality that I was too embarrassed to ask for help for my husband and best friend,” she said. “I shouldn’t have had that fear.”

Need help for yourself or a loved one?

You can find a comprehensive list of substance abuse treatment services by visiting our resource guide: Where to find substance use resources in Milwaukee.

Wisconsin Watch reporter Joe Timmerman contributed to this report.

Milwaukee is losing a generation of Black men to drug crisis is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Attempts to implement a red flag gun control measure in Wisconsin have been rebuffed several times in recent years, but some legislators hope the results of November’s election can change that. 

“When the political dynamic shifts in the Legislature, we have a better shot at not only introducing the (red flag) legislation but giving it a fair public hearing,” said Dora Drake, current state representative and senator-elect. “The people of Wisconsin overwhelmingly support red flag laws.”

Red flag laws, also known as Extreme Risk Protection Orders, allow judges to issue court orders to temporarily restrict access to guns by individuals who could pose a threat to themselves or others.

A red flag resolution was last introduced in Wisconsin in July 2023 but was shelved along with other resolutions in April.

In an interview before the election, Drake said she was hopeful that Democrats, who overwhelmingly support red flag laws, would assume a majority control in the Wisconsin Assembly.

That didn’t happen.

Instead, when the Wisconsin Legislature returns, Republicans will be in charge but have the narrowest majority since 2011, when they took control.

A push for stronger gun control laws

Drake said Wisconsin Republican lawmakers have not done enough when it comes to gun control measures. As a result, she said, people are at risk.

“As Democrats, we just want common sense laws on gun control, and that doesn’t mean we’re trying to take away someone’s Second Amendment rights,” she said. “People are tired of life being unnecessarily taken away.”

Jacob Taylor, communications director for Sen. LaTonya Johnson, said he thinks Gov. Tony Evers will once again include Extreme Risk Protection Orders policy in his biennial budget proposal. If Republicans remove it, he said, it will be reintroduced by Johnson and other legislators.

Red flag “legislation will remain a priority for Senator Johnson and other Democrats committed to reducing gun violence in our state,” Taylor said.

Twenty-one other states, including neighboring states Illinois, Michigan and Minnesota, have already enacted red flag measures.

In March, the U.S. Department of Justice launched the National Extreme Risk Protection Order Resource Center, which provides training and technical assistance to law enforcement, judges, social service providers and others on how to implement red flag laws.

Gun laws don’t address core issues, opponents say

Nik Clark, founder and chairman of Wisconsin Carry Inc., a group that advocates for Second Amendment protections, said his organization is against red flag laws for a number of reasons.

Specifically, he doesn’t believe the laws will reduce crime.

“Ninety-five percent of crime is committed by people who are already felons and not even allowed to have a gun,” Clark said.

He said red flag laws and other gun control measures such as universal background checks are attempts by the government to weaken due processes for gun owners, making it easier for their weapons to be unlawfully seized.

He said taking away people’s rights to legally bear arms won’t make communities safer.

“If someone is willing to harm someone else, they don’t care about any laws,” Clark said. “We spend so much time on trying to prevent things, and we need to spend more time on preparedness to address them.”

What do Extreme Risk Protection Order laws do?

Nick Matuszewski is the director of policy and program at WAVE Educational Fund, Wisconsin’s oldest anti-violence advocacy group.

He said Extreme Risk Protection Order laws add a layer of protection for communities by improving the system in which a gun can be removed from people in crisis or are looking to harm themselves or others.

These laws “can be applied in cases where family members and other folks in the community are able to notice that there are dangers,” Matuszewski said. 

He said red flag laws are known to reduce firearm suicides and can help prevent mass shootings.

“Unfortunately, there are too many folks in the state legislature . . . beholden to the gun lobby and are unwilling to enact a gun policy that infringes upon that relationship,” Matuszewski said.

What happens next?

Now that the dust has mostly settled from Election Day and Republicans still control the Assembly and Senate, will anything change?

Drake said lawmakers need to work together to move the needle in the right direction when it comes to preventing gun violence.

“We’ve already experienced so much trauma in our own communities, but there are things we can do to be preventative and intervene before more lives are lost, like implementing red flag laws,” she said. 

News414 is a service journalism collaboration between Wisconsin Watch and Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service that addresses the specific issues, interests, perspectives and information needs identified by residents of central city Milwaukee neighborhoods. Learn more at our website or sign up for our texting service here.

Will Wisconsin enact a red flag gun control law? The results of November election may not help is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

Gun violence homicides dropped by nearly 17% in Wisconsin over the first eight months of 2024 compared to the same time period in 2023, according to a report by the Center for American Progress, a nonpartisan policy institute.

The report, released in September, also found that gun violence victimizations, defined as all firearm-related injuries and deaths, dropped in Milwaukee nearly 20% over that same time period.

“I think this decrease is happening for a number of reasons, but one is due to community violence intervention measures that are working,” said Nicholas Matuszewski, executive director of Wisconsin Anti-Violence Effort, a statewide grassroots organization.

Local violence intervention efforts include 414 Life, a violence interruption program; and Project Ujima, which provides services to families and children who’ve been impacted by violence.

In addition, Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley announced in late October the launch of the national gun violence program “Advance Peace.”

“Advance Peace is an investment in solutions to decreasing gun violence that will help ensure Milwaukee County is a safe and healthy community where families and children can thrive,” Crowley said in a news release announcing the program.

‘Numbers are dropping’

Matuszewski said Milwaukee and the state are national leaders in community violence intervention efforts, citing the work of the City of Milwaukee Office of Community Wellness and Safety and also programs supported statewide through Wisconsin Community Safety Fund grants.

The Wisconsin Community Safety Fund grants provided 10 organizations, including the Alma Center in Milwaukee, with $10.4 million in funding to reduce violence stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic.

“After the pandemic, we had a huge increase in gun ownership and gun purchases which naturally led to more gun violence,” Matuszewski said. “Those numbers are dropping now.”

While many cities cited in the report have seen gun violence return or drop to pre-pandemic levels, Milwaukee is still on pace to experience more shootings this year than in 2019, the year before the pandemic.

According to data from the Milwaukee Homicide Review Commission dashboard, there were 442 nonfatal shootings in 2019. Those numbers rose to more than 750 each year from 2020 to 2023. So far this year, the city has experienced 471 shootings, according to information on the dashboard. 

‘Too many shootings’

Travis Hope, a community activist who conducts street outreach on Milwaukee’s South Side, said gun violence still occurs at an alarming rate in the city.

“Too many shootings are still happening and impacting families, communities and especially young people,” Hope said.

According to data from the Milwaukee Police Department, there have been 119 homicides in the city so far this year, compared to 153 during the same time period in 2023 and 192 in 2022.

The number of nonfatal shootings in Milwaukee also is down significantly, with 471 so far this year, compared to 769 at this time in 2023 and 788 in 2022.

Officials address drop in gun violence in Milwaukee

During a news conference discussing the reduction in shootings, among other crimes in the city, Mayor Cavalier Johnson cited the work of the Milwaukee Police Department as one reason for the drop in shootings and other crime this year.

“The work that they do is a big factor, a huge factor, in making Milwaukee safer,” he said.

Johnson said that in addition to law enforcement, intervention efforts have also been key in reducing crime.

“When we prevent a crime through intervention, that makes each and every one of us safer,” he said.

Ashanti Hamilton, director of the Office of Community Safety and Wellness, said that while the decrease in homicides and nonfatal shootings is promising, more work needs to be done.

“Reducing violence is an ongoing process,” he said. “Sustainable change requires addressing the root causes of crime, and this means looking beyond the immediate crime reduction strategies and focusing on broader social, economic and systemic changes that contribute to violence.”

News414 is a service journalism collaboration between Wisconsin Watch and Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service that addresses the specific issues, interests, perspectives and information needs identified by residents of central city Milwaukee neighborhoods. Learn more at our website or sign up for our texting service here.

Report: Gun violence down across Wisconsin, including Milwaukee is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

The Milwaukee Police Department has a hiring problem.

It can’t find enough recruits to offset retirements and the departure of others. 

Ald. Lamont Westmoreland, who represents the 5th District on the city’s Northwest Side, said residents are feeling the impact.

“Lack of police presence, long wait times on calls, all tied back to the lack of sworn officers that MPD has,” Westmoreland said.

Leon Todd, executive director of the Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission, which has primary responsibility in the city for recruiting, testing and hiring new officers, agrees.

“Having more officers and growing the size of MPD will do a host of things to improve public safety,” he said. “Shorter response times, higher clearance rates, more proactive time for officers to do follow-up or investigative work and have greater visibility and engagement opportunities in the community all drive down crime in various ways.”

In 2023, the Milwaukee Fire and Police Academy graduated 101 new police officers, while the Milwaukee Police Department lost 112 officers to retirement, resignation or termination, Westmoreland said.

The pace of recruitment is slow again this year, with departures of officers once again outpacing new police cadets.

The city also risks missing mandates that require beefing up the number of police officers in the city as part of the Act 12 Wisconsin funding law or face millions in fines. Act 12 created avenues to implement local sales taxes as a way to pump more money into the budget and offset spiraling costs.

“I have no issue with the mandate because I do think that we need more officers on the streets,” Westmoreland said. “At the same time, you can’t force people to apply for the job.”

Recruitment challenges and efforts

Westmoreland said Milwaukee is among a number of urban cities that are facing similar hiring challenges, including competition from better-paying suburban police departments with less dangerous work environments.

“We can’t use that as a crutch,” Westmoreland said. “We’ve got to be creative with the approach of recruitment.”

Todd said the Fire and Police Commission has made several adjustments over the past few years to find new police, including hiring two staff members dedicated to recruitment, participating in more community events and job fairs and ramping up marketing efforts to city residents.

“One of the things we’ve tried to do is highlight the stories of officers to let residents know that they are people that care about the community and want to help make it safer,” Todd said.

The commission also now accepts applications year-round instead of shorter windows of a few months. It also changed the testing process to allow for online entrance exams, eliminating additional barriers for applicants. 

Changes since pandemic and civil unrest

Kristine Rodriguez, a deputy for the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office who also supports recruitment efforts, said her organization faces similar challenges as MPD, especially since COVID and the George Floyd protests.

“Some of the things that happened during that time still resonate with people,” she said.

She said pay is also an issue, with suburban departments offering hiring bonuses and higher starting pays. They also work fewer hours sometimes, she said, as staffing shortages can result in mandatory overtime and fewer days off.

The current starting salary for recruits at MPD is $47,673.69 and increases to $63,564.75 upon graduation from the academy. Police officers can earn up to $84,743.87 while supervisors and other specialists can earn more.

‘Under a microscope’

Another possible deterrent, Rodriguez said, is the scrutiny officers face nowadays.

“You’re under a microscope 24/7 and that might scare some candidates away,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez said that her department places a heavy emphasis on community engagement, cultural competency and mental health training and that its relationship with the community has improved. She said the job itself is extremely fulfilling.

“We know that our heart is in the right place, and that’s what makes the job the most rewarding is doing good for the community,” she said.

Others weigh in

Gregory Barachy, who’s worked for the Milwaukee Fire Department for 29 years, said he thinks that being a police officer is probably less desirable now because of the danger and the lack of accountability for those who commit crimes.

“Crime is insane here, car theft is an epidemic along with the driving that goes with it,” Barachy said. “And then if you happen to arrest someone, they are released without penalty to do it again. Why would someone want to risk their lives for that?”

Barachy, who recently began a position with the Milwaukee Overdose Response Initiative, said the fire department has also experienced a huge reduction in applicants.

“We only had a list of 250 this time, while 20 years ago the list was 10,000,” he said.

Carla Jones, whose partner was mistaken as a suspect and arrested by Brookfield police in November 2023, said she believes fewer people want to become police officers because of a lack of support they receive.

“Some of the main reasons people are joining law enforcement less and less is the lack of morale or real support officers are given,” Jones said. “They’re not doing that because they’re working on a reactive mentality.” 

A call to disinvest

Devin Anderson is membership and campaign director for the African American Roundtable, which launched the Liberate MKE campaign in 2019 to push for divestment in law enforcement and more investment in community programming.

“In order to build a more just Milwaukee, we have to be moving money away from police and policing,” Anderson said. “We’d rather see fully funded libraries.”

Anderson said that residents want more safety and that some view policing as the only way to achieve that. But, he said, creating a safer city requires addressing root causes of crime, which the police department doesn’t do.

“They respond after something happens,” Anderson said. “What people actually want is more investments in their neighborhood.”

Testing a challenge

Two years ago, Eddie Juarez-Perez saw an ad seeking new cadets for the Milwaukee Police Department.

“I decided to answer the call for service,” he said.

Juarez-Perez applied and passed the background check and written and physical exam. But he failed a psychological exam taken by all potential recruits.

“They said I was deemed not suitable for the position,” Juarez-Perez said.

He isn’t giving up.

“I look at being a police officer as being a public servant,” Juarez-Perez said. “I love my city and want to help people have a good quality of life here.”

Rodriguez said she’s been working to recruit more women involved in law enforcement. But some she said are unable to meet the physical requirements needed to join.

“I think that definitely is a barrier for a lot of women who don’t have upper body strength or have time to train,” she said.

MPD hosts fit camps and other support to help potential cadets meet physical and testing requirements to become an officer.

“We’re trying to give people the best opportunity to prepare and succeed,” Todd said.

For more information

The Fire and Police Commission is recruiting for its next academy cohort.

News414 is a service journalism collaboration between Wisconsin Watch and Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service that addresses the specific issues, interests, perspectives and information needs identified by residents of central city Milwaukee neighborhoods. Learn more at our website or sign up for our texting service here.

Help wanted: Can the Milwaukee Police Department fix its hiring problem? is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.