“I Thought We Were Past That”: Questioning Coleman Young’s Conflicting Ideologies of Tough-on-Crime and Police Reform in Reference to the Malice Green Killing, 1974–94

The format of the poster will roughly be as follows. On the left-hand side of the poster, there will be two sections which will give a brief introduction to the historical concept and the process of the research. This takes the form of both a research review along some brief discussions of methodology. In the middle of the poster will be the bulk of the research that was done. It will have three unique sections covering Coleman Young's initial reforms, one covering the Citizens Complaint System and the Professional Standards Section, and finally one discussing the references to Malice Green. The right-hand side will cover the conclusions of the work along with its greater importance in historical research. This will be cut into two sections. The first being named "Why?". This section will cover two topics: why the reforms Young implemented weren't effective, along with why this work matters, which will cover the greater importance of the conclusions I've gathered. The second section will be the overall conclusions and will act as the general summary for the entire project. This poster seeks to historicize the conflicting tough-on-crime and police reform ideologies of Detroit Mayor Coleman Young. These policies help answer questions regarding what led to the events that culminated in the killing of Malice Green, along with questions regarding police brutality in Detroit. To answer these questions, a thorough investigation was conducted into multiple archival sources, such as the Coleman A. Young Mayoral Papers, which are located at the Burton Historical Collection in the Detroit Public Library. This poster argues that attributing the death of Malice Green to Coleman Young is short-sighted and irresponsible, as he did not pull the trigger. With that in mind, it is also argued that it is important to understand that Coleman Young’s tough-on-crime policies and lack of investment in fundamental police reform played a role in the attitudes that led to the death of Malice Green and so many others. Furthermore, the reform created by Young did not address the root issues with the police department that led to the killing of Malice Green because its focus on including minorities into a system that has fundamental problems does not solve those problems. To this point, the death of Malice Green comes from a mentality within the police force that had been present for decades. Despite this, Coleman Young’s tough-on-crime mentality, specifically with the war on drugs, contributed to this already existing problem by pushing the idea that crime needed to be stopped by any means necessary.