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Michigan

Political repression plays out state by state — shaped by local institutions, prosecutors, and movements for defense. These are the documented political prisoners and cases the census holds for Michigan.

334Documented
1In custody
185Released
8Awaiting trial

Eras of repression in Michigan

Where Michigan’s entries fall across the census’s historical eras.

1930s 74 1980s 51 1910s 45 1920s 33 1950s 22 2020s 21

Documented cases

334 entries in the census — every one stays in the record, whether the case is open or closed.

E
Ellwood Moore (Ann Arbor draft resister, 1917)
The AnnArbor report names UniversityofMichigan student and SocialistLocal member EllwoodMoore as arrested for...
L
Leonard Morse
Leonard Morse, one of the occupants of the Sweet home, was one of eleven Black occupants arrested in Detroit o...
L
Liam Mulholland
Released
Liam Mulholland, age 18 at indictment, pleaded guilty in 2013 to 18 USC 844(i) arson involving interstate comm...
C
Colm Murphy
Colm Murphy was an Irish activist from South Armagh prosecuted in the United States after a July 1982 FBI unde...
N
Norris Murray
Norris Murray, a handyman and chauffeur, was one of eleven Black occupants arrested in Detroit on September 9,...
E
Esther Nickman
Released
Esther Nickman was one of seven Detroit John Reed Club delegates arrested Saturday June 23, 1934 while enterin...
J
John North
John North was among workers arrested at or before the Grand Rapids August 1, 1929 antiwar meeting. The report...
L
Leo Novak
Leo Novak was arrested in a Pontiac home raid during the January 1930 Communist crackdown. The paper says poli...
T
T. J. O'Flaherty
T. J. O'Flaherty's first-person April 1927 Labor Defender memorial to C. E. Ruthenberg describes his own arres...
A
Andrew Olask
Released
Andrew Olask was a conscientious objector from Michigan imprisoned during World War I. Court-martialed for ref...
G
Gary Olivero-Johnson
Gary Olivero-Johnson of Grand Rapids was individually named as quickly arrested and held in Marquette County J...
M
Michel Olivero-Johnson
Michel Olivero-Johnson was one of four peace resisters jailed after the August 9, 1982 K. I. Sawyer Air Force...
E
Edgar Owens
Edgar Owens was named among ten Communist leaders surrendering in the Bridgman criminal-syndicalism prosecutio...
M
Mary Paige
Released
Mary Paige was a young American-born Detroit woman arrested in a dawn FBI raid on February 6, 1940, one of the...
P
Peter Passes
Released
Peter Passes was a conscientious objector from Michigan imprisoned during World War I. Court-martialed for ref...
O
Otto Passow
Released
Otto Passow was one of the Bad Axe, Michigan farmers charged with criminal syndicalism during the 1933 farm re...
G
Gregory Pelik
Gregory Pelik was arrested at a meeting at Communist Party headquarters in Detroit. The 1920 congressional cas...
R
Raymond Peoples
Released
Raymond Peoples was one of the "Livernois 5," five young Black men swept up in a Detroit police dragnet after...
H
Henry Podolski
Released
Henry (Henryk) Podolski was a Polish-born socialist journalist and official of the Polonia Society of the Inte...
G
Gus Polites
Released
Gus Polites was a Greek-born Detroit-area resident targeted for deportation over alleged past Communist Party...
C
Charles A. Poole
Charles A. Poole, a Catholic WPA worker, was lured from a Detroit beer garden May 12, 1936 by Black Legion men...
P
Pelaga Popovska
Released
Pelaga Popovska was a foreign-born Detroit resident targeted in a November 1953 McCarran-Walter Act roundup ov...
N
Nick Prokopenko
Released
Nick Prokopenko was a conscientious objector from Michigan imprisoned during World War I. Court-martialed for...
T
Tony Pruschuk
Released
Tony Pruschuk was a conscientious objector from Michigan imprisoned during World War I. Court-martialed for re...

Institutions in Michigan

Prisons, jails, and detention centers in Michigan that appear in the census’s case files.

Federal Correctional Institution, MilanMilan, Michigan
6 cases
FCI MilanMilan, Michigan
3 cases
Bay County JailBay City, Michigan
3 cases
Michigan State Prison (Jackson)
3 cases
Wayne County Jail
3 cases
State Prison of Southern MichiganJackson, Michigan
2 cases
Marquette State PrisonMarquette, Michigan
2 cases
Detroit RRMMilan, Michigan
1 case