A tiny downriver city is now staring at a big-city-sized mess, and the bill is already landing on the table.
In a Channel 7 investigation, WXYZ reporter Ross Jones lays out how Melvindale – population roughly 12,000 – agreed to a $1 million settlement tied to a police tasing lawsuit, and then got hit with a second punch: the city’s insurance carrier is walking away.
That combination matters more than the headline number, because a one-time settlement is painful, but losing coverage can turn every future incident into a budget emergency.
Jones’ reporting pins the story to one name: Lt. Matthew Furman, a Melvindale police lieutenant who, as Jones notes, has been generating complaints, lawsuits, and now criminal charges “throughout his career,” with the last year and a half bringing the most serious fallout.
This case isn’t framed as an abstract policy debate about policing.
It’s framed as a practical crisis for a small city that doesn’t have the money, staffing, or political bandwidth to absorb repeated legal hits – especially when the person at the center is still tangled up in the courts.
A $1 Million Settlement That Doesn’t End The Story
Jones reports that Melvindale entered into a settlement and that it’s “been resolved,” at least on the civil side, for one of two pending cases connected to alleged abuses by Furman.
The city agreed to pay $1 million to settle a lawsuit involving a traffic stop, and importantly, Jones points out that neither Furman nor the city admitted wrongdoing as part of the agreement.
That “no admission” language is common in settlements, but it doesn’t erase the broader question residents always ask after payouts like this: if nobody did anything wrong, why did it cost a million dollars?
The answer is usually buried in risk math.
Cities don’t settle because they feel generous; they settle because they fear what a jury might do, what a trial might expose, and what ongoing legal fees might become.
So even without an admission, the price tag itself becomes a loud statement that the city believed it was in danger.
Jones also emphasizes the settlement wasn’t a check cut directly from city hall—at least not immediately.
The city’s insurance carrier paid it.
But then the insurer delivered the kind of letter that can make a municipal finance director feel sick: we’re dropping you.
The Traffic Stop At The Center Of The Lawsuit
Jones traces the settlement back to a July 2024 traffic stop involving Drakkar Williams.
The lieutenant stopped Williams for driving around traffic barricades, and Jones says Furman later learned Williams shouldn’t have been driving because his license was suspended.
Then the encounter escalated.
Jones reports Williams refused to provide his name.
Furman moved to arrest him.
And not long after Williams got out of the vehicle, Jones says Furman “repeatedly tased him.”
The video sound bites Jones includes are short but sharp – commands like “Hands behind your back,” and the stunned reaction, “He got me. He got me.”
Even without showing every second of what happened, that sequence is enough for most viewers to understand why a lawsuit followed.
Traffic stops are already tense by nature, but repeated tasing becomes the kind of allegation that juries and insurers do not treat casually.
And this isn’t presented as an isolated complaint from one resident with one bad night.
Jones makes it clear this stop is one piece of a longer pattern that prosecutors and civil attorneys are now circling.
Criminal Charges And A Pattern Prosecutors Say They See
Jones reports Furman was later hit with assault charges stemming from the Williams stop, along with two other cases that Channel 7 says it revealed – cases brought by Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy.
That’s a key point: this isn’t just a civil dispute about damages.
This is a situation where prosecutors decided the alleged conduct was serious enough to charge a police lieutenant with assault.
Jones says the criminal case was bound over for trial in December, and that Furman has pleaded not guilty.
So the city is settling a civil case tied to an incident that is still very much alive in the criminal system.
That’s another reason insurers get jumpy. A pending criminal case doesn’t automatically mean civil liability, but it increases uncertainty and makes cities look like risky clients.
From an insurance perspective, “uncertainty” is another word for “we can’t price this safely.”
Jones also adds something that should hit residents close to home: the lieutenant hasn’t been on the street for about 18 months, yet people still call about him.
That line suggests the emotional footprint is still there. Not just physical harm claims, but a lingering sense that interactions with this officer left people rattled enough to keep talking about it long after the fact.
The Victim’s Attorney: “No Amount Of Money Can Restore Him”
Jones interviews attorney David Robinson, who represented Drakkar Williams in the civil suit.
Robinson’s quote is blunt and, frankly, familiar to anyone who has watched police misconduct cases play out.
“No amount of money can restore Mr. Williams to who he was before his encounter with Furman,” Robinson says, adding that the best thing that can happen is what the law can provide.
That’s the tightrope civil lawsuits walk.
Money isn’t supposed to be a “reward,” yet it’s the only tool the system offers to compensate for harm.
When a settlement hits seven figures, people argue about whether it’s too high or too low, but Robinson’s point is that the damage – physical, psychological, reputational – doesn’t reverse just because a check exists.
Jones also underscores that the settlement didn’t come with an admission, which means the city gets to say it didn’t concede wrongdoing, while Williams still gets compensation, and the public is left with the uncomfortable feeling that the truth sits somewhere in a file cabinet, never fully aired.
The Insurance Provider Drops The City – And That’s The Real Panic Button
Then Jones gets to what might be the bigger civic crisis: the insurance carrier that paid the settlement notified Melvindale that it will drop the city as a client.
Jones reports the city will need a new provider by April and is scrambling to find one.
For a large city, this is still a problem, but it’s a problem they can often solve with higher premiums and layered coverage.
For a town of 12,000, this can become a nightmare fast.
Insurance isn’t just a bureaucratic box to check. It’s the wall between a lawsuit and taxpayers directly eating the cost.
And as Robinson explains to Jones, without a carrier, the financial responsibility falls back on the city.
“They become self-insured,” he says.
That phrase sounds technical, but it’s basically this: if something goes wrong, you’re paying.
Out of reserves, out of budgets meant for roads or parks, or out of emergency measures like borrowing or cutting services.
In plain terms, it can turn one bad incident into layoffs, service reductions, or long-term debt.
Jones says there are multiple other lawsuits still pending against Melvindale, and that “city insiders” fear they may not find an insurance company willing to take the risk.
That’s where the story shifts from “one controversial lieutenant” to “a city’s ability to function.”
Even if Melvindale finds coverage, it may be so expensive that the city effectively pays a penalty for years, just to stay insured.
Silence From City Leadership Makes It Worse
Jones tries to get answers from the people residents expect to speak in moments like this.
He notes that Mayor Nicole Shakira and every member of the city council either declined to comment or said they didn’t have time.
That choice – silence – often backfires.
Not because they’re obligated to litigate details in public, but because residents aren’t just asking about one settlement.
They’re asking: who hired him, who kept him, who supervised him, and what safeguards failed?
Jones includes a sharp line from a source criticizing the city’s tolerance for Furman’s “antics,” suggesting leaders may be embarrassed to admit the city hired him and continued to put up with the drama.
That’s not a neutral description, but it reflects a real sentiment in communities when they see repeated legal trouble tied to one officer.
People don’t just blame the individual. They blame the system that kept the individual in place.
And the longer leadership avoids the microphone, the more it looks like the city is hoping the news cycle moves on before residents start showing up angry at meetings.
Furman’s Attorney Invites The Public To Watch The Trial
Jones reports that Furman didn’t respond to calls or texts seeking comment.
But Furman’s criminal defense attorney, Dennis Whittie, did provide a statement.
Whittie says he looks forward to the upcoming trial – Jones notes it’s currently slated for April – where he says he’ll present the facts to a jury.
He also invites people to watch the proceedings. That’s a calculated stance, and not an unusual one.
Defense attorneys often want the public to see what they believe is the “totality” of the evidence, especially if they think headlines have painted their client as guilty before trial.
But the invitation cuts both ways.
Trials don’t just test guilt; they expose details – training issues, departmental policies, supervision gaps – that can widen the political damage to the city even if the officer wins.
So while Whittie frames the courtroom as the place where truth will be shown, city leaders might dread that exact same spotlight.
Jones also reports Furman is on unpaid administrative leave, and his law enforcement license is suspended by the state.
That’s another detail that will stick with residents, because it signals the consequences are already more than internal discipline.
A suspended license is not a small administrative slap. It’s the state saying, at least for now, you shouldn’t be policing.
The Settlement Is A Warning Label
A million-dollar settlement is easy to reduce to a simple argument: “That’s what lawsuits cost now.”
But Jones’ reporting makes it hard to shrug off, because the settlement isn’t happening in isolation.
It’s paired with criminal charges, paired with other lawsuits, paired with an insurance carrier fleeing, and paired with leadership that won’t talk.
That combination is what turns this into a civic stability story instead of a courtroom story.
When cities lose insurance, they don’t just lose money—they lose breathing room.
Every call for service, every arrest, every use-of-force complaint becomes a potential financial landmine.
It can also create pressure on officers who are doing their jobs correctly, because suddenly the city has to worry about risk exposure in a way that can change policies overnight, sometimes in clumsy ways.
And for residents, the anger isn’t only about the lieutenant.
It’s about being forced to pay – through taxes, through reduced services, through higher premiums – for leadership failures they didn’t choose.
Jones ends with a simple prediction: this probably isn’t the last we’ll hear from Furman, and residents are going to be mad.
That feels right, because when the money is this large and the consequences ripple out to insurance coverage, the story doesn’t end when one lawsuit settles.
It ends when the city either proves it has control of its police department – or the lawsuits and financial fallout prove it doesn’t.
Raised in a small Arizona town, Kevin grew up surrounded by rugged desert landscapes and a family of hunters. His background in competitive shooting and firearms training has made him an authority on self-defense and gun safety. A certified firearms instructor, Kevin teaches others how to properly handle and maintain their weapons, whether for hunting, home defense, or survival situations. His writing focuses on responsible gun ownership, marksmanship, and the role of firearms in personal preparedness.
