A Michigan Court of Appeals panel has dismissed felony kidnapping, terrorism and firearms convictions against a man accused of aiding the 2020 plot to kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
Attorney General Dana Nessel slammed the decision published Tuesday and vowed to appeal the ruling that she said “sends a deeply dangerous message.”
Whitmer’s office also condemned the opinion that could result in freedom for Joseph Morrison, who was sentenced to four to 20 years in prison for his role in the kidnapping plot while part of the militia group Wolverine Watchmen.
"Today’s decision by the Michigan Court of Appeals doesn’t change the underlying facts: Joseph Morrison and other men supported an effort to kidnap and murder Governor Whitmer,” said Chief of Staff JoAnne Huls. “They committed crimes, and they must be held accountable. Releasing them poses a danger to the public and letting them walk is a threat to our democracy. We do not agree with today’s decision, which invites a culture of fear and violence in Michigan and the country.”
Morrison was convicted in Jackson County of gang membership, providing material support for terrorist acts, and possessing a firearm during the commission of a felony related to his role in the plot to kidnap Whitmer. Morrison was sentenced in December of 2022 alongside other members of the militia group Wolverine Watchmen.
Nessel called the decision to vacate Morrison’s convictions “completely and irredeemably nonsensical, outrageous and irresponsible."
"For the panel to declare that kidnapping is not a violent felony strains all legal credibility and insults the intelligence of every person in this State. The Court twists itself into a knot using legal and linguistic gymnastics in order to liberate dangerous criminals using convoluted definitions of the crimes upon which they were convicted," Nessel said.
The unanimous decision by Judges Thomas Cameron, Brock Swartzle, and Mark Boonstra sends the case back to the Jackson County Circuit Court for a new trial, but Nessel said her office will appeal the ruling.
The judges held the circuit court’s instruction to the jury describing kidnapping as a “violent felony” was an error because that is not part of the law after it was updated by the Legislature in 2006. The opinion said that change to the law was pivotal in its decision.
“The 2006 amendment of the kidnapping statute rendered essentially meaningless the inclusion of the kidnapping statute as part of the definition of ‘dangerous to human life,’” said the opinion authored by Boonstra. He wrote that may or may not be what the Legislature intended. “But under the plain language of the statutes as they currently exist, kidnapping is not an act of terrorism,” he wrote.
That finding was behind the collapse of the other convictions, which were predicated on the terrorism charge.
Nessel said she will take the case to the Michigan Supreme Court.
