Domestic violence complaints plague Grand Ledge mayoral candidate Michael Doty

Correction: The print version of this article incorrectly described Doty's role in one of the incidents. 

A candidate for the mayor of Grand Ledge has a long history of run-ins with police, including allegations of domestic violence and assault from at least four different women, entailing two ex-wives, his current girlfriend and his sister.

None of the allegations resulted in arrest or criminal charges. On three occasions, the alleged victim declined to press charges.

The candidate, Grand Ledge Councilman Michael Dean Doty, 45, denied he did anything wrong other than get into heated arguments and use bad judgment in his choice of relationships. Doty notes that after the first divorce, he retained full custody of his two daughters, and after his second divorce, a stepdaughter chose to live in his home rather than with his ex-wife.

Doty was first elected to Grand Ledge City Council in November 2017 as a write-in candidate. There were no candidates listed on the ballot, and he won with just 18 write-in votes after he announced his candidacy on Facebook. A small businessman, he’s the owner of Doty Custom Audio & Video.

He’s one of three candidates for Grand Ledge mayor this fall. The other candidates are incumbent Thomas Sowle, who was appointed mayor after Kalmin Smith stepped down in June 2018, and Michael Coll, a former City Councilman who ran against Smith four years ago.

Former State Sen. Rick Jones, R-Grand Ledge, has observed the race closely. He said Sowle and Doty have the most yard signs. He said Doty “comes from a very prominent family in Grand Ledge and a lot of people think he’s going to win. It appears to be a close race, although I think the race is over because so many voters are voting absentee.”

Jones said he has not endorsed anyone.

A man identifying himself as a Grand Ledge resident sent police reports to City Pulse that he said he had obtained through a state Freedom of Information Act request. The man asked not to be identified because he said he feared retaliation.

Doty told City Pulse that the police records were released to the media because of a smear campaign. He alleged they were given to the media by a political insider who wished to derail his campaign.

“I had no reason to think anything would come up because I didn’t think I did anything wrong,” he said. “I’ve never been convicted of anything. I’ve never spent a day in jail. I thought you were innocent until proven guilty or so I thought.”

He believed a political enemy is slinging gossip at him to boost the candidacy of Sowle. Efforts to reach Sowle were unsuccessful.

Doty’s first pair of police incidents date to November 1997 when he was 23 and he said his marriage was failing and he was melting down in the “worst month of my life.”

On Nov. 11, 1997, his first wife said he yelled at their 4-year-old child, and she intervened, according to a Grand Ledge Police report. She accused him of throwing her in a chair and pinning her there. The child told police that her parents had been fighting and her dad pushed her mom. Doty denied to police that he did anything to his wife beyond restraining her arms, and the responding police officer noted she had no signs of visible injuries.

“I really don’t want to press charges. I just want this kept on file just in case something was to happen in the future,” the wife told police. Those sentiments were repeated by his sister on Nov. 20, 1997, after a second incident involving police.

Doty’s sister told police that he yelled at her, so she slapped him. She said he then threw her on the bed, which caused her to slam her head against the wall, she told police. She alleged to police that he said he could kill her with his bare hands.

“She slapped me in the face. I actually pushed her back. End of story,” Doty said. “This was a fight with my sister from 22 years ago.”

On April 9, 2017, at 4:15 a.m., Doty called police to his mobile home in Grand Oaks Village on North Clinton Street in Grand Ledge to report chaotic behavior by his second ex-wife, with whom he was married from 2007 to 2012. Doty said she came at him with a knife and police reported minor abrasions on his skin and hers. Police confiscated the butcher knife.

He called the police on the ex-wife a second time that morning to have her removed after she later returned and crawled through the window of his trailer.

Police tried to follow up the next day with a search warrant, but the ex-wife refused to press charges, and the warrant was denied. Doty told City Pulse that he soon sought a restraining order against this woman, whom he called “extremely manipulative.”

The last alleged victim, his current girlfriend and fiancee, told City Pulse that she gave the police a false story while delusional and under the influence of psychiatric medications.

On Oct. 23, 2017, two weeks before Doty was elected to Grand Ledge City Council, she told Grand Ledge Police Officer Jill Fewer that she and Doty had been at a party in Flint and he drove them home drunk and assaulted her in the car. She said she fled the vehicle and hitchhiked west on I-69 and was picked up by a Good Samaritan who returned her to Grand Ledge.

The police documents included details of her psychiatric stay at Sparrow St. Lawrence Hospital in Lansing and her Michigan Department of Health & Human Services records. She accuses the Grand Ledge Police Department of violating federal privacy laws by disclosing her medical information to the public without the proper redactions.

In the interview with City Pulse, she wore a Michael Dean Doty for Grand Ledge Mayor button and supports him. She says none of the Flint drinking and hitchhiking story was true. Doty also denied it ever happened.