Mike Lutz
Mike Lutz was a Wisconsin attorney with Canfield & Lutz, LLC. Prior to becoming an attorney, Lutz spent 17 years as a decorated Milwaukee police officer.[1] In 2005, Lutz was shot while serving a no-knock warrant for weapons on a Milwaukee apartment building. The shooting left Lutz with a damaged arm, and he was put on duty disability.[2]
Lutz attended the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, graduating with an undergraduate degree in criminal justice. In 2010, he graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison law school. Before going into private practice, he was employed with the Milwaukee County District Attorney's office.[1]
On July 26, 2015, Lutz committed suicide in the presence of Menomonee Falls police officers following a "brief tactical situation." According to Wisconsin Watchdog reporter M.D. Kittle, "Multiple sources tell Wisconsin Watchdog that Lutz lived an agonized life in the years after he was shot while on the job in 2005. Things got worse, those sources say, after he went public about Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm’s 'hyper-partisan' pursuit of Republican Gov. Scott Walker."[3][4]
John Doe investigations
Two John Doe investigations were launched by Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm (D) into the activities of staff and associates of Governor Scott Walker (R). These investigations and the events surrounding them have been described as "the most tumultuous political events in Wisconsin in generations—perhaps in history."[5]
Lutz was pulled into the John Doe investigations related to Scott Walker media spotlight when he came forward to provide an explanation of Chisholm's motivations for launching the investigations.
In September 2014, Stuart Taylor, of the American Media Institute, published an article in Legal Newsline detailing what a source described as Chisholm's potential motive for so doggedly pursuing the John Doe investigations. In the article, Taylor wrote:[6]
| “ | Now a longtime Chisholm subordinate reveals for the first time in this article that the district attorney may have had personal motivations for his investigation. Chisholm told him and others that Chisholm’s wife, Colleen, a teacher’s union shop steward at a school in St. Francis, which is near Milwaukee, had been repeatedly moved to tears by Walker’s anti-union policies in 2011, according to the former staff prosecutor in Chisholm’s office. Chisholm said in the presence of the former prosecutor that his wife 'frequently cried when discussing the topic of the union disbanding and the effect it would have on the people involved … She took it personally.'
Citing fear of retaliation, the former prosecutor declined to be identified and has not previously talked to reporters. Chisholm added, according to that prosecutor, that 'he felt that it was his personal duty to stop Walker from treating people like this.' [...] Still, Chisholm’s private displays of partisan animus stunned the former prosecutor. 'I admired him [Chisholm] greatly up until this whole thing started,' the former prosecutor said. 'But once this whole matter came up, it was surprising how almost hyper-partisan he became … It was amazing … to see this complete change.' The culture in the Milwaukee district attorney’s office was stoutly Democratic, the former prosecutor said, and become more so during Gov. Walker’s battle with the unions. Chisholm 'had almost like an anti-Walker cabal of people in his office who were just fanatical about union activities and unionizing. And a lot of them went up and protested. They hung those blue fists on their office walls [to show solidarity with union protestors] … At the same time, if you had some opposing viewpoints that you wished to express, it was absolutely not allowed.'[7] |
” |
| —Stuart Taylor | ||
Samuel Leib, Chisholm’s private lawyer, responded to the allegations, saying they amounted to a "baseless character assault" that "is inaccurate in a number of critical ways." He provided no specifics. He added that "John Chisholm’s integrity is beyond reproach."[6]
Eric O'Keefe and Mike Lutz appear on The Kelly File with Megyn Kelly on April 23, 2015
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One of Chisholm's previous supervisors, former Milwaukee County District Attorney E. Michael McCann (D), also rejected the notion that Chisholm's motivations were partisan, saying, "I knew who on my staff were the political people, and John Chisholm was not one of them until he ran for office."[8]
Dan Bice, of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, exposed Lutz as the anonymous whistleblower. Lutz had worked in Chisholm's office as an unpaid community service special prosecutor between late January and early August 2011, "just as Walker took the reins as governor and just as all hell broke loose in Wisconsin." Lutz had also been a close family friend of Chisholm and his wife, Colleen, as Lutz's policing partner was Colleen's brother, Jon Osowski.[9][6]
After Taylor's article was published, Bice showed up on Lutz's doorstep on the evening of September 11, banging on the door loudly enough to wake and upset Lutz's 12-year-old daughter and prompt Lutz's neighbor, an off-duty policeman, to come outside with a gun drawn to investigate the disturbance.[10]
In his column the next day, Bice revealed that Lutz was, indeed, Taylor's source and also disclosed that Lutz suffered from PTSD after being shot on the job. Bice wrote that Lutz was formerly close to the Chisholm family before a falling-out ensued. Bice detailed a voicemail in which an apparently intoxicated Lutz allegedly leveled death threats against Chisholm and his family. Lutz considered a libel suit against the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel as a result of the claims made in the article.[10][11]
Taylor did a follow-up article on September 9, 2014, reporting on the backlash against Lutz for revealing Chisholm's alleged motives for the investigations.[12]
In October 2014, Taylor reported that Lutz was considering a libel suit against the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and Bice.[13] No suit was filed prior to Lutz's suicide.
See also
- John Doe investigations related to Scott Walker
- Timeline of John Doe investigations related to Scott Walker
- Wisconsin John Doe laws
- Scott Walker
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Canfield & Lutz, LLC, "Michael Lutz, Founding Partner," accessed May 13, 2015
- ↑ Spingola Files, "A ‘Real Go-Getter’ Steps Up," accessed May 13, 2015
- ↑ WisconsinWatchdog.org, "A tragic end for a John Doe whistleblower," July 27, 2015
- ↑ CBS 58, "Former Milwaukee Police Officer Michael Lutz dies from apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound," July 27, 2015
- ↑ State of Wisconsin Circuit Court Milwaukee County, "Petition for Commencement of a John Doe Proceeding," August 10, 2012
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Legal Newsline, "District attorney’s wife drove case against Wis. Gov. Walker, insider says," September 9, 2014
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, "Courts to decide whether John Doe a useful tool or unfair witch hunt," May 18, 2014
- ↑ Watchdog.org, "A whistleblower’s story: Taking on a ‘hyper-partisan’ district attorney," September 29, 2014
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Legal Newsline, "Whistleblower mulling libel suit against Milwaukee newspaper over ‘death threat’ claim," October 6, 2014
- ↑ Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, "Source who accused Chisholm of vendetta has troubled past," September 12, 2014
- ↑ Legal Newsline, "Decorated Wis. cop says he paid dearly for blowing whistle on DA’s crusade against Gov. Walker," September 19, 2014
- ↑ ‘’Legal Newsline’’, “Whistleblower mulling libel suit against Milwaukee newspaper over ‘death threat’ claim,” October 6, 2014
