During his (Gary Davis-Headd's) sentencing in October of 2019, his first wife, Choree Bressler, told the court he used his mother's connections to protect him.
Findings Of Commission Hearing - Judge Tracy Green Complaint No. 103
Judicial Tenure Commission
Jun 13, 2022
Judicial Tenure Commission's Decision And Recommendation For Discipline - Judge Tracy Green Complaint No. 103
Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission
July 29, 2022
DETROIT, MI, July 29, 2022- The Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission has issued a Decision and Recommendation in FC 103, as to Hon. Tracy E. Green, 3rd Circuit Court.
Commission wants Wayne Circuit Judge Tracy Green removed from bench
The Detroit News
July 29, 2022
Detroit – The Judicial Tenure Commission has concluded that Wayne County Circuit Judge Tracy E. Green committed misconduct in lying about the abuse of her young grandsons by her son, and they want her removed from the bench.
The commission – which investigates complaints about Michigan’s judges – released its findings Friday. The commission says that at a July 18 session it had “unanimously concluded there was a preponderance of the evidence” that Green had committed misconduct which “included concealing evidence of her son’s abuse of her grandsons and then lying about it in a multitude of forums and to a host of people, in some cases under oath as a judge, impeding the investigations of the abuse and these proceedings.”
The Commission’s recommendation now goes to the State Supreme Court which can determine there was no misconduct by Green, or decide to censure, suspend or remove Green from the bench.
Green has insisted she committed no misconduct, that her grandsons were lying about having told her multiple times about suffering physical abuse by her son, Gary Davis-Headd, who was ultimately convicted of two counts of second-degree child abuse in Wayne Circuit Court. She also maintained that the Tenure Commission proceeding against her was unconstitutional and that she was entitled to an in-person hearing – which the commission rejected.
“In this case, (Judge Tracy Green) concealed evidence that her son abused her grandsons," Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission staff members Lynn Helland and Lora Weingarden wrote in one filing. "She thereby violated the criminal law by tampering with evidence of a crime. She lied about having done that, and told multiple related lies in court, to the media, during the Commission’s investigation, and during the hearing before the Master.
"Her conduct was also selfish in that she was trying to save face in supporting her abusive son at the expense of her grandsons, while she ran for judge in 2018 on the platform that she was a child and family welfare advocate."
The boys were under the age of 11 when their father repeatedly spanked, slapped and beat them with a belt as a form of discipline, according to court filings.
Elected in 2018 to the Circuit Court's family division, Green has served in the criminal division since 2019. She was an attorney for more than two decades. She is known for her work in reuniting parents with their children who were in foster care.
Reached Friday, Green’s attorney Michael Ashcraft said neither he nor the judge could comment on the case outside of legal filings.
“It is the judge’s hope that the public will read those filings which are available on the Tenure Commission’s website,” Ashcraft said but declined to elaborate or even confirm whether Green would remain on the bench pending a decision by the State Supreme Court.
In February, retired Ann Arbor trial Judge Betty Widgeon, appointed special master by the commission, determined that Green violated Michigan court rules and the state's rules of professional conduct by knowingly concealing evidence of the abuse of her grandsons and making false statements about her knowledge of that abuse.
Widgeon found that the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission did not prove a third complaint, that Green's false statements to the commission were intentional.
Helland, who is executive director of the commission, and Weingarden, a staff attorney, pushed back against that finding, arguing there is ample evidence that Green knew of the abuse and that "her omissions, denials, and misrepresentations were deliberate."
In 2019, Green's son was sentenced to concurrent 4- to 10-year prison terms for each conviction. The commission lodged a complaint against Green in November 2020.
State commission says judge should be disbarred for lying about her son's child abuse
Detroit Free Press
July 30, 2022
A Wayne County judge who ran for office as an advocate for children should be removed from the bench because she used makeup to hide injuries inflicted on her grandchildren by her abusive son and then repeatedly denied to state investigators that she knew of the abuse, according to an official state report this week.
The report by the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission, the state agency charged with disciplining judges for misconduct, ends with a unanimous recommendation to the Michigan Supreme Court that Wayne County Circuit Judge Tracy Green be removed from office. The state Supreme Court has the final say on whether to disbar a judge, although the justices generally side with a unanimous recommendation of the commission.
Green’s son, Gary Davis-Headd, was given a sentence in 2019 of four to 10 years in prison for each of two counts of second-degree child abuse, to be served concurrently, after Davis-Headd was convicted of beating his two sons. He was given the sentence before a courtroom audience that included his mother, who was elected in 2018 to a six-year term on the Wayne County bench.
Green has steadfastly denied knowing of the abuse even when she was placed under oath, the report said. Green’s attorney in the investigation, Michael Ashcraft Jr. of Bloomfield Hills-based Plunkett Cooney, said Friday in a statement: “Everything that Judge Green would like to say about this matter is in her filings and the hearing videos, which she hopes the public will read and watch. All of that information is posted on the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission’s website.”
The commission's lengthy investigation included 12 public hearing days held in 2021. According to this week’s report, Green’s misconduct “included concealing evidence of her son’s abuse of her grandsons and then lying about it in a multitude of forums and to a host of people," in some cases while under oath as a judge.
The commission's lengthy investigation included 12 public hearing days held in 2021. According to this week’s report, Green’s misconduct “included concealing evidence of her son’s abuse of her grandsons and then lying about it in a multitude of forums and to a host of people," in some cases while under oath as a judge.
“Especially with her background as a family law attorney advocating for minors, she was far too involved and present in her son’s and grandchildren’s lives to credibly claim ignorance of what was going on, especially since her grandsons’ much more credible testimony was that they repeatedly told her about the abuse and showed her evidence of it in the form of their bruises and other bodily marks,” the report says. Early on as a judge, Green presided over family court but she was moved to a criminal docket after the case against her son arose.
In some beatings, Green’s son used a belt to “whoop” his children, the report states.
The report says that workers from Child Protective Services visited the home of Green’s son at least four times in 2015-18 to check into suspected child abuse, until her grandsons were removed from the home by police in June 2018. Green’s behavior and statements to investigators “placed her grandsons in peril,” the commission’s report said.
At one point in the report, it lists eight written statements Green made in November 2019 to the commission’s questions, all of which the investigators deemed to be false. Green’s son was also abusing his wife. The commission’s investigation determined that between July 2014 and June 2018, the judge “was aware that on multiple occasions her son had been abusive to his then-wife, Katy Davis-Headd, by slapping her and choking her,” according to the commission’s formal complaint issued in November 2020.
Summarizing its report this week, the commission’s recommendation ended by saying that Green’s misconduct “is comparable to, or worse than, the misconduct that caused the Supreme Court to remove other judges.”
Commission wants family judge disbarred after her son was convicted for child abuse
FOX 2 News - Detroit
August 4, 2022
FOX 2 - A judicial commission says a Wayne County judge should be disbarred for lying about her son's child abuse.
The Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission is making the recommendation about Judge Tracy Green. who serves in Wayne County family court for her part in covering up the years-long abuse.
In 2019 her son, Gary Davis-Headd, was convicted of beating his children on two felony counts of child abuse. Five months after, his children told FOX 2 that he had beat them - and that his mother - Judge Tracy Green, helped cover up the abuse.
"My dad would tell her about a bruise I had or something and she would put makeup on it because we had to go to school and stuff," said one of her grandchildren to FOX 2's ML Elrick in 2019. "He didn't want people to see."
"I didn't put makeup on any bruises to conceal any abuse," she said in response. "That is utterly preposterous. It just didn't happen.
"I am certainly capable of protecting children from my perch as a Third Circuit Court judge. There is nothing I have done, or would ever do, to jeopardize the safety of any child. Particularly a child that I love. And what I am saying to you Mr. Elrick, is that I've done nothing wrong.
"I have not failed to do something that I should have done, and that's the bottom line."
Gary Davis-Headd told the judge he only beat his children with a belt to correct them.
During his sentencing in October of 2019, his first wife, Choree Bressler, told the court he used his mother's connections to protect him.
"Their father beat them brutally for years, without fear of any repercussions, because of who his mother is. Judge Tracy Green created and raised a monster," Bressler said.
The five children were removed from their father's home and were sent to live with their birth mothers.
Attempts to reach Judge Green were unsuccessful.
Commission wants judge who lied for child abuser son be disbarred
FOX 2 News - Detroit
August 05, 2022
Gary Davis-Headd told the judge he only beat his children with a belt to correct them. During his sentencing in October of 2019, his first wife, Choree Bressler, told the court he used his mother's connections to protect him.
Wayne County judge's bad judgment endangers kids, creates legacy of shame
Detroit Free Press
September 11, 2022
Tracy Green didn't trust the legal system before she was elected to serve Wayne County as a judge in 2018 — and in less than three months on the job she gave the rest of us a reason not to trust it, either.
The Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission wants the state Supreme Court to throw Green off the bench for lying about nine separate matters related to her son's abuse of her grandchildren. If they want to make it an even 10, they could include lying to me about whether the rest of us could trust her to protect our children.
Green began her litany of lies as a witness in the very courthouse where she demanded that other witnesses give the truth, the whole truth and nothing but that truth.
That's what you and I call irony. And it leads to what legal eagles call obloquy, which is a fancy word I had to look up that essentially means "make people so mad that they will say very bad things about the justice system," because some malignant magistrate engaged in conduct "that is contrary to justice, ethics, honesty, or good morals."
But trying, and failing, to get her son off the hook for beating her grandchildren is just one of the reasons Green isn't fit to serve. Her poor judgment exposed other children to danger and even forced a parent whose daughter was beaten to death to relive the ordeal a decade after the killer was convicted of murder and torture.
Green's conduct during her brief career as a judge has been so poor that Wayne County has twice had to hire retired judges to take over her caseloads — at a cost to taxpayers of $160,000 per judge, per year.
Now Green sits at home waiting for the state Supreme Court to decide whether to put her out of her misery ... or prolong our own.
Two witnesses, one liar
Journalists will do almost anything to avoid taking the witness stand. But I was a candidate for Detroit City Council in 2021 when the Michigan Judicial Tenure Commission called me to testify in Green's disciplinary hearing, so I complied. At issue was an investigation I did in 2019 while working for Fox 2 News that included allegations Green helped conceal how her son Gary Davis-Headd beat her grandchildren.
Green had published articles asserting that the deck was stacked against parents before she was elected to the Wayne County Circuit Court in 2018. Her expertise in family law may be why she started her judicial career in juvenile court.
In March 2019, after less than three months on the job, Green was a witness in her own courthouse in a case that would determine whether her son would lose custody of his children.
Green testified that she was unaware her son was beating his children and said she did not use makeup to cover up one of her grandson's bruises. Behind the scenes, Green helped her son's attorney craft his defense. But the judge in the case nevertheless ruled that Davis-Headd had abused his children and terminated his parental rights. Four months later, a criminal court judge found Davis-Headd guilty of child abuse and sentenced him to four to 10 years in prison.
In the meantime, I began investigating allegations that Green lied on the witness stand in her son's child custody case. We met in May 2019 for an interview in which I asked her: "If you, a family court judge, can’t protect your own grandkids, can the people of Wayne County count on you to protect our kids?"
Green, on camera, replied: "I am certainly capable of protecting children from my perch as a Third Circuit Court judge. There is nothing that I have done or would ever do to jeopardize the safety of any child, particularly a child that I love. And what I’m saying to you Mr. Elrick is that I’ve done nothing wrong, I’ve not failed to do something that I should have done, and that’s the bottom line." (Wayne County is also known as the Third Circuit Court.)
A family court judge didn't believe Green. And her grandsons knew she was lying. But her real problem was the Judicial Tenure Commission, which investigates judges. They filed a formal complaint against Green and my Fox 2 report became evidence in the case. During cross-examination, Green's lawyer, Michael Ashcraft, was determined to use me to create a crack Green could slip through.
Ashcraft zeroed in on a 6-second clip in which Green told me that she did not "put makeup on any bruises to conceal any abuse." He tried to get me to agree that "Tracy Green did not say that she did not put makeup on the boy's face."
After scrutinizing video of my testimony, and based on a review of the Judicial Tenure Commission's findings, I believe Ashcraft was trying to establish that Green did put makeup on her grandson's face, but not "to conceal any abuse."
If so, it was a fine point that wasn't fine enough to buffalo Betty Widgeon, the judge presiding over Green's disciplinary hearing. Widgeon, who heard from many witnesses, found that Green's "careful use of language show[ed] an attempt to avoid admitting any knowledge that would lead to liability." She also wrote that Green used vague and evasive language to avoid answering investigators' questions and used her legal training and a “sophisticated mastery of language to mislead or misinform CPS (Child Protective Services), the Juvenile Court, and the Commission about her knowledge of [her son’s] treatment of [her grandsons] while still attempting to preserve plausible deniability concerning false statements.”
Commissioners were more direct: They called Green a liar.
Other adjectives they used to describe Green included, "not credible," "not plausible," "deceit," and "untruthful."
On July 18, commissioners voted unanimously to recommend that the Michigan Supreme Court remove Green from the bench. They noted that if Green's only transgression had been covering up her son's abuse before she became a judge, they would not call for an end to her judicial career.
"But the maxim 'the cover up is worse than the crime' plays itself out in a variety of contexts and legal proceedings," commissioners wrote, noting that the crime itself was pretty bad when you consider that "the misconduct involved jeopardizing the welfare of minors by an attorney who purports to advocate for children."
Ultimately, commissioners wrote, Green's "cover up at very least unquestionably triggers the harshest discipline of removal" because the state Supreme Court has established a precedent of removing judges who lie under oath.
It's worth noting that commissioners also were not impressed that Green tried to save her skin by claiming that the grandson she purported to love — but failed to protect — was "a confirmed liar."
Fruit of the poisonous tree
The lawsuit was almost certainly filed in the hope of leveraging a nuisance settlement. You could call it a slap suit, which would be appropriate, because Davis-Headd seems to think a slap is the best way to resolve problems. This time, however, he wasn't going up against little kids. And when it comes to the law, no one slaps around Herschel Fink.
Fink is a preeminent media and First Amendment attorney. His client list includes the Free Press and luminaries including Dr. Dre who, like me, drops phat beats and dope rhymes — or is it dope beats and phat rhymes? A panel of three lawyers who reviewed Fink and Davis-Headd's legal arguments unanimously ruled that the case had a value of $0 and labeled it "frivolous." Fink essentially scored a first-round knockout when Wayne County Judge David Groner promptly dismissed the case, ruling that Davis-Headd was, as high falutin' legal scholars say, full of baloney.
Groner wrote that I provided "an accurate report of public and official proceedings concerning (Davis-Headd's) crimes and convictions," adding that Davis-Headd's "felony convictions on child abuse and domestic violence charges … shock the conscience."
I haven't heard from Davis-Headd since the lawsuit was dismissed. Of course, that may just be because I don't accept collect calls.
Needless suffering
There are few things stronger than a mother's love, as Green demonstrated by risking her judicial career in a failed attempt to save her son. But Green showed little concern for another mother who lost her child in a brutal murder.
Peter Dabish was convicted in 2010 of first-degree murder and torture for beating his girlfriend to death. Prosecutors said the 6-foot-3 Dabish, whose father was a co-founder of the Powerhouse Gym franchise, hit 5-foot Diana DeMayo or slammed her into something hard nearly two dozen times. There was so much blood in Dabish's downtown apartment that even DeMayo's dog was covered.
Three medical examiners and the neurologist who examined DeMayo's body said she died from the brutal beating.
A jury convicted Dabish.
A Wayne County judge sentenced him to life in prison.
The Michigan Court of Appeals rejected Dabish's appeal.
The Michigan Supreme Court declined to review the case.
None of that was enough for Green, who, with less than two years experience as a criminal court judge, decided to put DeMayo's family through hell.
Again.
In 2020, Green granted Dabish's request for an evidentiary hearing after his lawyers hired an expert who said emergency medical technicians caused DeMayo's death. The expert said they improperly intubated her while trying to save her life. Dabish's lawyers had unsuccessfully floated a similar theory in 2010, raising questions about why Green would reopen old wounds by entertaining an already rejected legal theory. Green did not respond to my message seeking comment, and Ashcraft told me she would not discuss the case.
I also called Linda DeMayo, Diana's mother, who still can't understand why Green essentially reopened the case.
"The trial was a month long, and it was horrific," Linda DeMayo told me. "I spent 10 years getting through this and was in a good place with post-traumatic stress disorder. … This opened up the wounds majorly."
During the 2010 trial, Linda DeMayo was in the courtroom and did not look at the gruesome photos from the crime scene or autopsy.
The 2020 hearings were virtual, and she found she could not look away.
“I lost it. I lost it," she told me, pausing to compose herself. "I never realized what they had to do to do the autopsy. … That was hard.”
Linda DeMayo said she wrote Green a long letter “begging her to please end this, because I’d been through enough.” She said Green's staff acknowledged receiving the letter, but said the judge couldn’t respond.
In the end, Green reached the same conclusion as everyone who had looked at the case before her: Dabish did not deserve a new trial.
Linda DeMayo, who tutors students preparing for college entrance exams, acknowledged that Green was fairly new on the job when she decided to hear Dabish's arguments.
"I like giving people an opportunity to improve," Linda DeMayo said. "However, I think this is too important a position, a job, a career, to make that many mistakes on."
From her home in Florida, she follows Green's own troubles with the law.
"And, no, I don’t think she should ever be a judge."
Children at risk
After reporting on Green's testimony in her son's custody case, I began examining the abuse and neglect cases that Green presided over in family court. Because she had not been on the bench for very long, there were not a ton of cases to review. And, after Wayne County Circuit Court Chief Judge Timothy Kenny watched my Fox 2 report, he reviewed a transcript of the trial at which Green and her grandson testified and told Green she would not handle any abuse and neglect cases until her son's legal matters are resolved.
Still, the cases I reviewed indicated that Green was reluctant to take children out of dangerous homes, and inclined to send children back to homes that other judges had deemed unsafe.
One case I have kept tabs on started in March 2018. Child Protective Services asked a judge to remove toddlers from the home of a mother who was still just a kid herself. She was 15 years old, couldn't care for her three children and was living with her mother and grandfather. The grandfather had a criminal history, was suspected of sexually abusing his daughter, and years earlier had his parental rights terminated. A judge ordered the children removed and taken into protective custody.
Eight months later, a judge reviewing the case ruled that the three babies should not be returned to their young mother because doing so would expose them to "substantial risk of harm to the children's life, physical health or mental well-being."
After that judge retired at the end of 2018, the case was transferred to Green's docket.
The Department of Health and Human Services argued in 2019 that the children's mother should not regain custody because residents in the home where she was staying were under investigation for criminal sexual conduct. One of the children allegedly told Child Protective Services workers that an uncle touched her private parts.
Nevertheless, Green ordered the children returned to their mother, who was now 16. In an apparent acknowledgment that they faced some danger, Green ruled that their uncle and grandfather should stay away from them.
By July 2019, Green had been removed from family court and the case went to another judge. He ruled that the children should not be returned to their mother because it would put them at risk.
Justice in the balance
We conclude with a classic "good news, bad news" situation.
For the second time in three years, Wayne County's chief judge brought in a retired judge to take over Green's caseload. That means the public won't be at the mercy of a judge with bad judgment. It also means taxpayers are on the hook for Green's $160,000 salary and another 160 large for the retired judge called in to do her job.
Kenny told me he felt he had no choice after the Judicial Tenure Commission labeled Green a liar and recommended her removal.
"It was most appropriate for public confidence in the judiciary here in Wayne County that she not hear cases until her matter is resolved with the (state) Supreme Court," he said, adding that he did not have the authority to stop paying Green while she is essentially suspended.
Now it's up to the Michigan Supreme Court to decide Green's fate.
As the justices consider whether to accept the Judicial Tenure Commission's recommendation, they may find the Supreme Court's own guidance in such matters useful:
"When a judge lies under oath, he or she has failed to internalize one of the central standards of justice and becomes unfit to sit in judgment of others.”
Case closed.
