COMPROMISING THE CASE
POLICE RUSHED TO INTERVIEW A WELL-CONNECTED SUSPECT, POSSIBLY
Detective Steve Wells had his instructions: Question real estate developer Kalan Haywood Sr. about the sexual assault allegation against him, and do it soon. Milwaukee Police Chief Alfonso Morales had asked Haywood to serve on the board of a new fundraising organization, the Milwaukee Police Foundation, but the chief didn’t want someone with a criminal case hanging over his head. The detective quickly reviewed the reports of lead investigator Zachary Thoms, who was on vacation, then scheduled an interview with Haywood. It would take place on the afternoon of Aug. 13, 2019, just hours before the foundation’s board was scheduled to meet. The timing of the interview and the fact that Thoms didn’t conduct it would later spark conflict-of-interest concerns. So would its location: Sojourner Family Peace Center.
Sojourner is divided into three connected parts: a secure shelter, meeting rooms and office space used by the Police Department’s Sensitive Crimes Division and others who work with victims.
Because the location of the shelter isn’t a secret, one key to helping victims feel safe is keeping them separate from the people accused of crimes.
An agreement between Sojourner and the Milwaukee Police Department was straightforward: Police were not to “interview or detain suspects at the center and avoid practices that may compromise victim safety and recovery.”
The center’s executive director, Carmen Pitre, and Edward Flynn, who preceded Morales as police chief, signed the document in 2015, the year before the center opened.
But in the aftermath of Haywood’s interview there, every cop involved in the case, from Morales on down, claimed not to have known about it.
It isn’t clear who made the decision to question Haywood at Sojourner. Detective Wells later said he thought it was his captain, John Corbett, but Corbett said it wasn’t him. When Haywood’s accuser found out later, she was not happy, considering she’d gone there several times to meet with police.
Steven DeVougas, Haywood’s real estate lawyer and chair of the powerful civilian Fire and Police Commission, was in favor of police talking to Haywood at the center to help protect his privacy.
Haywood was a fairly recognizable figure at City Hall and on Milwaukee’s north side, which he’d worked to improve by redeveloping aging and abandoned buildings. A few months earlier, he’d gotten a $4 million taxpayerbacked loan to jump-start his latest project: converting a former Sears store at 2100 W. North Ave. into the 80-room Ikon Hotel.
Haywood had worked with Pitre on the deal that resulted in Sojourner’s new building. And he and DeVougas had spoken with Pitre more than once about selling Sojourner the building Haywood owned across the street, a former Masonic lodge. Unlike at a district station or police headquarters downtown, DeVougas assured Haywood, anyone who saw them at Sojourner would probably assume they were taking a tour.
“I work with Carmen Pitre and the rest of them,” Haywood told Wells not long after he arrived there for questioning. “You know how nervous I was coming in this building? … It has other ramifications.”
Wells replied: “No one who’s alleged to be a suspect ever comes in this building. So if Carmen Pitre or anyone else saw you, the last thing in their mind would be that you’re a suspect . ...
“Because, actually, if they found out that I’m talking to you here right now, Carmen’s going to be right in my captain’s office, because anyone who’s alleged to be anything near being a suspect does not come in this building. That’s downtown only. This is a DV shelter.”
When Pitre found out months later, that’s almost exactly what she said.
‘I think he’s just checking the boxes’
DeVougas was the first to arrive in Sojourner’s lobby.
When Wells saw him, the detective came to an immediate realization: This man wasn’t just Haywood’s lawyer. He was the chairman of the Milwaukee Fire and Police Commission, the civilian oversight board with the power to promote and discipline cops like him. Essentially, DeVougas was his boss, and his captain’s boss, and even the police chief’s boss.
The whole thing, Wells said later, made him “nervous as hell.”
After a brief chat with DeVougas, Wells called Corbett, his captain, to tell him who was in the lobby and how he felt about it.
Corbett’s response: Do your job. Wells went to the cozy interview room designed for conversations with victims, which was outfitted with equipment to record audio and video. Wells turned everything on, then walked out.
About 15 minutes later, Haywood arrived, and he and DeVougas were shown into the room, where they chatted for a few minutes while waiting for Wells to return. DeVougas told Haywood
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he’d heard it was standard operating procedure to arrest all sexual assault suspects.
“That’s a lawsuit waiting to happen,” DeVougas told Haywood, saying he would get a copy of the department’s policy on such arrests.
Unsaid was this: Due to his position on the commission, DeVougas was among those with the power to change that policy.
DeVougas also tried to convince Haywood that Wells was on their side.
“He said, ‘We’ve got to investigate,’ ” DeVougas told Haywood. “I’m like, ‘I’m not saying you don’t got to investigate. But you know, it’s innocent until proven guilty.’ ”
The attorney added: “I hope he really doesn’t want to charge you. I think he’s just checking the boxes, that’s what my instinct is telling me.”
A few minutes later, Wells walked in and started the conversation by saying he recognized DeVougas as a member of the Fire and Police Commission.
“Yeah,” DeVougas said. “I’m the chair.”
“You’re the chair,” Wells said. “Um, it just seemed a little odd that, you know, I mean, you actually are like oversight over me, you know, so.”
DeVougas interjected: “But I’m not in that capacity.”
“I know you’re not but it’s still —” Wells said.
“Weird, I know,” DeVougas said. “Very weird, it’s like, um, me sitting here interviewing the chiefs, you know, or something like that, you know,” Wells
said. “So I just wanted to get that — get that out.”
“I didn’t want to, like, interfere,” DeVougas replied. “It just happened that I’m his lawyer.”
‘Never have I ever put anything in anybody’s drink at any time, ever’
The woman who accused Haywood of sexual assault, identified publicly only as Jane Doe, was terrified he would find out she’d contacted police and retaliate.
She “feared for her safety due to Haywood’s actions and the fact that he is known as a very important person amongst civic leaders of Milwaukee,” a police report says.
The woman later said she had begged Corbett, the sensitive crimes captain, not to tell Haywood her name, and she believed he’d agreed.
It’s not clear if Corbett made that promise or told Wells about it. If he did, it didn’t sink in. The detective revealed the woman’s name — even spelling it — minutes after he started questioning Haywood.
Her allegation, Wells said, was that Haywood had put drugs in her drink, raped her and urinated in her mouth.
Haywood confirmed he had a sexual relationship with the woman and had recorded their encounters several times. He said he didn’t remember the details of what happened the last time they got together or whether he made a video that day. He repeatedly denied assaulting her.
Haywood told the detective that although he had urinated on other women, he couldn’t remember if he’d done so with Doe.
Haywood explained: “It’s a real live act, it’s a — she’s kneeling there and you actually urinate while she’s in a bathtub and you urinate, so it’s a clear thing that you clearly would remember. It ain’t like, quick. … It’s a thing that lasts a half hour.”
Wells didn’t tell Haywood that Doe’s version was nothing like that. According to a police report, she said she had passed out and when she regained consciousness, the corner of her couch was soaked with urine. She later called Haywood to ask what happened, she told police, and he said: “I pissed in your mouth and you liked it.”
Wells framed it this way with Haywood: “She wants to know why did you urinate in her mouth. … She wants answers to her questions, and because it’s an allegation of a sexual nature, we actually have to look into it.”
Haywood called the woman’s accusations “crazy.”
“Never, never have I ever used — never have I ever put anything in anybody’s drink at any time, ever,” he said.
Haywood went on to say he had no motive to drug Doe, because she would do anything he asked.
“I ain’t never had to do nothing to nobody to make them have sex with me,” he said.
DeVougas — who later said he was there only to represent Haywood’s business interests, not to serve as his criminal attorney — remained by the developer’s side during the nearly two-hour interview and interjected at least 22 times.
At one point, DeVougas said this: “So Mr. Haywood is not in custody, not a suspect, whatever.”
At another, he said this: “So we explained, right? He never brought no liquor to her house. He never made no drinks for her because that wasn’t the nature of their relationship. … We don’t know if she was drinking all that day. We don’t know none of that.”
He and Haywood agreed they would look for Haywood’s videos of his encounters with Doe and turn them over to police.
“We’ll get it and hopefully we’ll just put a pin in this thing,” DeVougas said.
He and Haywood stood and shook hands with the detective.
“My hand is wet from water, not with sweat,” Haywood pointed out.
The briefing Morales received about the meeting did nothing to ease his concerns about adding Haywood to the Milwaukee Police Foundation’s board. Within hours, Morales and Assistant Chief Raymond Banks, who had recommended Haywood for the position, asked him to withdraw.
He agreed and did not attend the board meeting that evening.
Still, the situation seemed to mark the beginning of a downward spiral in the relationship between DeVougas and Morales.
Before the end of the month, DeVougas summoned Morales to his office at Haywood’s real estate company. DeVougas wanted to discuss the chief’s possible reappointment, which the Fire
Milwaukee police officer James Collins, right, is shown in a screenshot of body camera footage from the arrest of Milwaukee Bucks guard Sterling Brown in 2018.
and Police Commission would have to approve.
Haywood walked into the conference room, too, and spent most of the time talking about irrelevant topics, Morales recalled. The chief didn’t know why Haywood was there.
“I was just confused,” Morales later told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Caught off guard and puzzled, he didn’t ask Haywood to leave, Morales said.
He added: “Maybe I should have.”
Spending taxpayer dollars
The fact that police had questioned Haywood about a possible sexual assault didn’t cut off his access to city funds.
In September 2019, a month after Haywood met with Detective Wells, the Common Council voted 11-4 to provide a second taxpayer-backed loan for the Ikon hotel to Haywood’s investment group — this one for $5 million.
As they had the first time, some council members voted no. This time, they were backed up by a new report from Milwaukee’s comptroller showing taxpayer-backed financing for the hotel project carried significant risk.
Haywood had failed to pay his taxes on time more than once, and the city had sued him in small claims court several times.
If his company failed to secure additional funding elsewhere and defaulted on the Ikon loans, taxpayers could be out millions of dollars. The city could be forced to foreclose, take possession of the building and sell it, likely at a huge loss.
There was one caveat: Haywood would not be allowed to use the $5 million until after he had acquired all possible funding from other sources, including private investors and state and federal historic preservation tax credits. Proponents of that second loan argued that its approval would likely help Haywood attract the necessary investors, thus reducing the risk.
Mayor Tom Barrett signed off on the second loan to Haywood’s investment group, HG Sears LLC, whose legal point of contact was Haywood’s real estate lawyer: DeVougas.
Combined with the $4 million loan Haywood received earlier, city taxpayers were now potentially on the hook for $9 million. The terms called for Haywood’s LLC to repay the money over 20 years, with payments beginning in fall 2021.
Turnover at the commission
Meanwhile, DeVougas was fast becoming the most influential member of the Fire and Police Commission. Appointed by Barrett in 2013, DeVougas was one of the group’s longest-serving members and was well-versed in its powers. Not only did commissioners select the chief, they had the authority to force the hand of Police Department leaders on policy decisions.
A showdown with Flynn — which likely played a role in his decision to retire — showed they were willing to use it.
Commissioners also had the final say on promotions and discipline of officers, which they had used to make Raymond Banks an assistant chief just a month after the police union hand-delivered a female officer’s sexual harassment complaint against him.
DeVougas certainly seemed to know more about the commission’s operations than its ever-changing cast of executive directors, who were tasked with advising the members.
When Barrett appointed and the Common Council approved Griselda Aldrete to the cabinet-level position in August 2019, she became the third person to hold it in two years.
Almost immediately, Aldrete was forced to correct a discrepancy on her resume that overstated her criminal justice experience. Not long after that, she approved a no-bid contract to spend $61,500 in taxpayer money on an outside public relations firm she hoped would bolster the agency’s image. It didn’t work.
Aldrete faced continuous criticism, from violations of the open meetings law to complaints of micromanagement and creating a toxic work environment. More than 20% of the staff quit or were fired.
One longtime inspector said Aldrete’s management team had “demonstrated a frightening ignorance of (Fire and Police Commission) operations, shown no apparent knowledge of industry norms for public safety oversight investigations and, worse, fostered an environment of mistrust and cronyism.”
Aldrete later acknowledged she could have handled things differently but said much of the dysfunction predated her time in the job.
“There was a lot of things I walked into ... that I felt needed to change,” she said. “Change is hard.”
Last chance
Morales was facing criticism, too. By the fall of 2019, he had served as chief for just under two years. He was finishing the term of his predecessor, Flynn, which was set to expire in January. Unless the Fire and Police Commission voted to grant Morales his own four-year contract, his time as chief would come to an end.
The last thing he needed was a public reminder of the first misstep of his tenure. But that’s what he got when the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel published a story with this headline on Oct. 1, 2019: “Milwaukee officer who left 4-year-old girl overnight in tow lot also involved in Sterling Brown arrest.”
Brown, then a guard for the Milwaukee Bucks, was arrested before Morales became chief, but the way he handled the aftermath drew considerable criticism. Morales suspended the first officer on the scene, as well as two sergeants. But he did not discipline Officer James Collins, who stepped on Brown’s ankle as the NBA player lay on the ground.
The 4-year-old survived her night in the tow lot unharmed, and Collins once again kept his job.
Instead of firing him, Morales offered Collins a two-year “last chance” agreement, which allowed him to stay on the force as long as he didn’t violate any department rules. Morales also suspended Collins for 35 days.
That wasn’t good enough for DeVougas. The chair of the Fire and Police Commission wanted Collins out.
“We need some sacrificial lambs,” Morales recalled DeVougas saying.
To Morales, the message was clear: If he wanted to continue as chief, he would have to fire Collins.
But Morales felt his hands were tied. He believed Collins would challenge a termination before the commission and the courts — and possibly win. When Collins signed the last-chance agreement, he gave up his right to do that.
According to Morales, DeVougas wouldn’t let it go.
That October, the commission pledged to decide before the end of the year whether they would grant Morales his own four-year contract. The board held one meeting to collect public input. They solicited written comments from the community about whether Morales should continue as chief.
And then: Nothing. DeVougas canceled a commission meeting scheduled for the first week of December.
“There’s no rush for us to hand out a four-year term,” he told a reporter. He said of Morales: “If a contract expires and he wants to do something else, then it falls to the next person in line.”
Two men were at the front of that line. One of them was Banks, the assistant chief who had recommended Haywood — his longtime friend and DeVougas’ business associate — for a spot on the board of the Milwaukee Police Foundation.
The commission was scheduled to convene its last meeting of 2019 on Dec. 18.
Before then, a Journal Sentinel reporter received a very interesting package.