Fletcher Reinstated Ib Flint Police

Fletcher Reinstated To Flint Police

Suspended policewoman Madeline Fletcher has been reinstated to the Flint Police Department with back pay amounting to $7,470.

Fletcher will receive a 90-day suspension, retroactive to last January when she was suspended without pay following a December 27 shoot-out with a number of white police officers behind Flint police headquarters, and will return to work October 11.

The incident left Fletcher and Officer Walter Kalberer wounded and resulted in Fletcher's suspension and subsequent acquittal of assault charges.

Several other Flint officers shot at Fletcher after she shot Kalberer in the leg in an attempt to defend herself.

Kalberer had ordered Fletcher to move from the driver's seat of their patrol car as the two officers prepared to leave the station to go on patrol.

When Fletcher refused, Kalberer grabbed her and attempted to eject her from the driver's seat, touching off a scuffle that ended in the shooting.

Fletcher has been suspended without pay since January. Kalberer went on paid sick leave after the shooting and is currently on active duty. Along with the Fletcher reinstatement, Kalberer received a five-day suspension. He was never charged in the shoot-out case because, in the words of the county prosecutor, "It would only further polarize the community."

Ken Cockrel, Fletcher' s defense attorney, has maintained from the beginning that it was the racist and sexist atmosphere of the Flint Police Department that led to the confrontation last December.

Cockrel has announced plans to appeal the 90-day suspension.