Detroit Police cooperated in search for alleged kidnapper, officials say

FRIDAY, July 7 — Lansing and Detroit Police Department officials blamed today the Michigan State Police for providing incorrect information that led to an inaccurate news story yesterday concerning efforts to find alleged kidnapper Rashad Trice.

The City Pulse story reported that Detroit Police had refused an LPD request to check out an area where a ping of Trice’s cellphone indicated he had been. The body of Wynter Cole-Smith, Trice’s 2-year-old alleged victim, was found near there two-and-a-half days later.

However, the story was apparently based on incorrect information that multiple sources provided to City Pulse after word spread in Lansing city government and the Lansing Police Department that Detroit Police would not follow up on the cellphone data.

“A representative from the Michigan State Police returned a call to LPD advising that DPD would not be able to check the areas until more information was gathered,” Lansing Police Chief Ellery Sosebee said in a written statement.

“At this time, Officers from the Detroit Police Department were already checking the areas of interest based on the first request,” Sosebee added.

The  call referenced by Sosebee was the result of inquiries to MSP by LPD and Ingham County Dispatch.

The Michigan State Police did not have an immediate response today when asked if it was responsible for spreading incorrect information.

In his statement, Sosebee said MSP and DPD as well as LPD were “aggressively working on this case and were navigating numerous requests at the same time.”

Detroit Assistant Police Chief Charles Fitzgerald said today that Sosebee told him that the information “was relayed through a lieutenant from MSP.

“So, that was MSP that was saying those things,” Fitzgerald said.

“That lieutenant was the one that said that DPD would not do something, which is, again, just factually inaccurate.”

City Pulse’s sources confirmed today that they had not received updated information when they spoke yesterday.

Another inaccuracy in the story was that the Detroit Police Department has a policy against pursuing suspects without warrants for their arrests. That was based on information from a local official who said he was given that explanation when he heard the erroneous report that Detroit Police had refused the LPD's request.

City Pulse called Dayna Clark, public information director for the Detroit Police Department shortly after 9 a.m. Thursday for comment. Clark’s administrative assistant referred City Pulse to the FBI for questions. The FBI declined to comment. Later, Clark first placed an angry call to City Pulse for not having sought comment. But later she apologized, explaining that City Pulse’s request never got to her.

Sosebee said he was “confident all involved jurisdictions including the Detroit Police Department did everything that was asked of them and more to find the accused and assist with locating Wynter.”

Fitzgerald said officers from Detroit began responding to information put out across the Law Enforcement Information Network (LEIN) at about 1 a.m. July 3. They continued responding to updated information until approximately 10:30 a.m. July 3. He said Monday morning at about 5:40 a.m. officers were dispatched to the vicinity of where Cole-Smith’s body was discovered Wednesday night.

“The closest location would've been probably four blocks away, going off of just memory,” Fitzgerald said. He said he had a “stack” of documents to verify each action taken by Detroit officers during the frantic Amber Alert search for both Cole-Smith and Trice. He declined to make those documents immediately available, requesting instead a Freedom of Information Act request be filed for the documents.

Trice, 26, and Cole-Smith were the subject of a statewide Amber Alert at about 2 a.m. July 3. The alert was put out after Lansing Police were called to the home of Trice’s ex-girlfriend on a domestic violence report. The woman had been stabbed. Law enforcement found Cole-Smith’s younger brother in the home, but she was missing, as was her mother’s car.

Monday at about 5:45 a.m., Trice was apprehended in St. Claire Shores, approximately 10 miles away from where Cole-Smith’s body was found in an overgrown alley.

Fitzgerald said Law enforcement searched areas broadly identified by cell phone geolocation data until “they were able to fine-tune those XY coordinates through re-reviewing the pings from the phone.”