Documents collected and analyzed by UW-Milwaukee geography Professor Anne Bonds show examples of racial covenants in Milwaukee, one for a residential subdivision and another for a cemetary. (Wisconsin Examiner photo illustration).

“Do you ever wonder why there are Black neighborhoods?” Derek Handley, an associate professor of English, African and African Diaspora and Urban studies at UW-Milwaukee, asks his students. How did Milwaukee County become one of the most segregated counties in the country, and what has that meant for the generations of families who either benefited from that bigotry, or were the targets of it?

On Saturday Handley, alongside fellow UW-Milwaukee professor Anne Bonds, will unveil a new project that deeply examines the historic use of racial housing covenants in Milwaukee. From 1-3 p.m. at the Milwaukee Public Library’s Centennial Hall, the professors will present “Mapping Racism and Resistance,” the culmination of three years of work and reflection by thousands of Milwaukee residents. 

Racial covenants were legal clauses in property records that explicitly prohibited people who were non-white from living within, occupying, owning or even being present on certain properties. The first covenants in Milwaukee popped up  in the city of Wauwatosa in 1911, 10-20 years before neighboring states established similar practices. Covenants in Wauwatosa and the rest of the Milwaukee area pre-date the practice of redlining,  where financial institutions systematically denied mortgages and financial investments to residents from Black and minority neighborhoods, and which began in 1938. 

In fact, the covenants set the stage for later forms of discrimination like redlining. Bonds explained that redlining was “a process that re-enforced and layered upon racial covenants” and that the level of racism in some communities was so strong it motivated entire neighborhoods to send the message to Black, brown and non-Christian people that they were not welcome. 

Covenants became popular during the 1920s and continued into the 1960s, even after multiple Supreme Court rulings rendered them illegal and, in theory, unenforceable. 

Sometimes the covenants were established before houses were even built in an area. Other times neighbors spent time and money in the courts to create covenants in already developed areas. “It cost money,” said Bonds, “it wasn’t cheap to go and then insert these racial covenants into their property records kind of after the fact.” Not only did covenants root themselves in communities which did not yet have Black residents, there were actually more restrictive covenants than there were Black residents of Milwaukee from 1910 to 1960. Milwaukee had a very small population of Black people when covenants arose, Handley said, adding, “there were three times as many covenants as there were Black people.” Bonds stressed that, “None of this is really passive in any way, shape, or form…It’s a very active whites-only kind thing.” 

That history “disrupts the notion that Jim Crow only happened in the South,” Handley told the Wisconsin Examiner. Never before has a map of racial covenants centralized or visualized those records for study. A network of over 6,000 people helped transcribe and analyze 1.9 million images of deeds, wills, court cases, property records and other Milwaukee County documents from 1910-1960. The records needed to be indexed, converted and checked by five different people to verify that they were covenants. Although computer programs helped organize the bulk of the data, human volunteers were needed to sift out false positives and to verify the findings. 

Mapping Racism and Resistance is both a crowdsourcing effort and a reckoning for the community. Not only does it map where the racial covenants were in Milwaukee County, “but more than anything we wanted the project to be about teaching people more, exposing people to more about the mechanisms and the kinds of techniques that were used to segregate cities,” said Bonds. “And it’s really painful to see this language, and jarring…It’s really jarring. It’s one thing to learn about housing discrimination and to say, ‘Yeah, people didn’t want to live by people who were not white.’ It’s another thing to see that language that says, ‘This home can never be occupied by anybody of the colored race.’ And to see that language inserted in a legal document, it’s pretty eye opening.” 

Mary Roberts, one of the project’s volunteer transcribers who helped upload and verify the covenants, was shocked by what she saw. Having grown up in Sheboygan when the community was essentially whites-only before attending UW-Milwaukee, Roberts had a peripheral understanding of Milwaukee’s housing covenants. Now at retirement age, she was drawn to the project out of a desire to get involved in social justice issues in the city. 

“I have to confess, I did not really understand it,” Roberts told the Examiner. “I understood it in the abstract, but it really deepened my understanding in a way that I just don’t know if I can fully explain. You know, reading in black and white these very calculating and cold and indifferent property deeds…It was incredibly eye-opening to me.” Seeing the racial covenants went far beyond any lesson that can be learned in school, Roberts said. “I was born in 1965, so some of the racial covenants I found were like, they were living, breathing documents in my lifetime. So I went into this thinking that it was really more about history, but it is a living history that was really present in my lifetime. And I think that was very surprising to me.” 

A large portion of the covenants reviewed by Roberts were established in Wauwatosa and largely discriminated against Black people. However, she also found covenants from Greenfield, and others which also included Jewish people and other non-Christians including  Armenian people and Asian people. Covenants also existed to the north and east of Wauwatosa, as well as in Milwaukee’s Sherman Park, Sunset Heights and Roosevelt Heights neighborhoods on the South Side near the airport. “A lot of people talk about the way that Milwaukee is surrounded by its predominately white suburbs,” said Bonds. “And certainly when you look at the racial covenants, you can see that pattern playing out, that they surround the city of Milwaukee.” 

Roberts noticed that the covenants seemed to put the racial clauses alongside other restrictions like not being allowed to have livestock, or how close a lot could be to a street or property line. She described the covenants as “this very cold, unemotional, sickening language that really is treating people like farm animals, or like an out-building.” 

“So much of the language really was like, you know, no person of African American descent, no one who’s Armenian, could live at this property ever, unless you were a servant. Some of them even excluded servants from properties…It says that in one spot, and then in the next spot it says you can’t have any farm animals at this property. So it was really equating people to really sub-human status, essentially.” 

The Greenfield covenant Roberts found was created by neighbors who’d formed a homeowners association and signed their names to the record. As she transcribed the records, Roberts found herself thinking of her own life, and how the property she lives on now had been passed down through three generations of her husband’s family. “We could never have built the house that we did if we had not inherited land from his dad,” said Roberts. “So it really hammers home in a way that I think other things don’t, that ability to build generational wealth was really denied to a whole class of people in our community. And that those inequities persist today, because that is how things were back then.” 

The same aspect of the project struck Handley when he and Bonds met the descendants of Zeddie Hyler, the first Black homeowner of Wauwatosa. In 1955 Hyler sought to build a home in Wauwatosa, but had to get a white friend to buy the property before he could begin. Local residents attempted to harass him out of the neighborhood, and even resorted to arson. Hyler’s descendants told the professors that Hyler and his brothers were forced to camp out with shotguns in order to protect the house. Hyler died in 2004, and his home has been designated as a historic place. 

Handley recalled looking online to compare the value of the Hyler family home with the house he’d moved from in Milwaukee’s Bronzeville neighborhood. “We’re literally talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars, so the racial wealth gap is so significant because of housing discrimination,” said Handley. Resisting racist housing practices took bravery and ingenuity. “Black people in Milwaukee knew about it, NAACP was actively fighting against it,” said Handley.

In the early 1940s, NAACP Attorney George Brawley surveyed plats filed in Milwaukee County and found that about 90 percent of the subdivisions in Milwaukee County since 1910 had some type of restrictive covenant which “pledged the owner not to sell or rent to anyone other than Caucasians.” Wilbur and Ardie Clark Halyard, who founded Columbia Savings & Loan Association in 1924, helped give Black people, poor whites and other disadvantaged groups the opportunity to get a loan to buy a house. While other states focused on winning in court, key players in Milwaukee worked on economic efforts to “break into certain neighborhoods, to provide the economic means for Black people to get the support they need to purchase homes, and then try to find pathways into those neighborhoods,” Handley told the Examiner. 

This history of defiance is also something the professors hope the Nov. 8 unveiling of Mapping Racism and Resistance will reveal to people, especially those who may not believe that the housing covenants really played a role in shaping their community, or who doubt that their legacy continues to endure. Hyler’s story particularly shows how far people would go to maintain whites-only communities. Although the covenants became unenforceable after the 1960s, communities like Wauwatosa maintained racist attitudes. In the late 1980s, a whistleblower exposed that Wauwatosa police officers, firefighters and residents were attending annual Martin Luther King Day parties where attendees wore Black face, distributed fliers suggesting hunting Black people instead of deer, and other racist behaviors. 

In late 2020, Mayor Dennis McBride acknowledged that “the Wauwatosa I grew up in was a racist, almost totally white community,” though he denied that it struggles with racism today. Earlier that year, some Wauwatosa residents received letters which stated: “We Whites must stand together. We must keep Wauwatosa free from Blacks and their lack of morals. We must keep Blacks from destroying our property, raping our wives and daughters, and recruiting our children into street gangs. We MUST keep Wauwatosa great. Together we can keep Wauwatosa White! Together we can keep Wauwatosa safe!” The Wauwatosa Police Department said that it didn’t plan to investigate who distributed the letters, and the department focused on surveilling and disrupting Black Lives Matter protesters that summer. 

Wauwatosa didn’t elect its first Black alderman until 2022. The following year, Wauwatosa’s common council voted to request that the state dissolve its housing covenants, which still exist today as invalid clauses of deeds passed to homeowners upon buying certain properties. Other Milwaukee-area suburban communities, like Brookfield, continue to struggle with accepting affordable housing developments and newcomers. 

Bonds cautions against the impulse to erase uncomfortable histories. Most people don’t want to live in a home with racist ownership clauses, Bonds told the Examiner, and “it’s a relic of the past, and something that is obviously really dark.” Yet, Bonds said, “We are wary of erasing the record,” because “removing them today obscures the work that they’ve already done. We can take them out of here now, but it doesn’t mean that they didn’t have an impact. It doesn’t mean that they didn’t do the work that they were set out to do when they were implemented in the first place.” The covenants conferred legal and economic power regardless of whether people who have benefited from them are “able to see it or understand it,” said Bonds.

A fully interactive website planned as part of the project has been delayed due to grant cuts, and Bonds and Handley are also working on a book. Viewers will be able to look up covenants for properties, and get down even to the parcel-level. “I definitely see this as just part of a longer study of trying to understand housing and the availability of housing to all residents of Milwaukee County,” said Bonds. “We really view this as a community project.”  

Roberts says Mapping Racism and Resistance captures an important history for people to see, especially people whose families have lived in communities built on a foundation of covenants and redlining for generations. “It’s important to not look away from that,” said Roberts. “And unless we’re having these tough conversations, I don’t think anything can get better.” Handley agreed, adding, “this is part of Milwaukee’s history, and what we can learn from it, and what we can do moving forward.”

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Jack Daly, who was convicted and sent to prison last year after pleading guilty to defrauding thousands of conservative political donors out of money — including a scheme claiming to draft former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke to run for the U.S. Senate — has emerged from federal custody to quietly re-establish himself as a top Republican Party campaign fundraiser.

A NOTUS investigation found that dozens of federal-level Republican political committees — including the Republican National Committee, numerous congressional committees and campaign operations tied to President Donald Trump — have together spent nearly $18 million on digital fundraising, donor lists and other services from Daly’s latest political consulting firm, Better Mousetrap Digital, according to Virgin Islands corporate filings and Federal Election Commission records.

Daly established Better Mousetrap Digital in September 2023, around the time he surrendered his North Carolina law license, accepted notice of disbarment and pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit mail fraud and lying to the Federal Election Commission.

Federal prosecutors alleged that Daly “targeted vulnerable victims, including a woman with Alzheimer’s and elderly veterans.” A judge in December 2023 sentenced Daly to four months in prison, a $20,000 fine and nearly $70,000 in restitution payments.

Federal Bureau of Prisons records indicate Daly exited federal custody in June 2024. He is scheduled to remain under supervised release until mid-2026 and is currently petitioning a federal court to vacate his conviction.

Daly, through his attorney, Brandon Sample, declined to answer a series of questions from NOTUS about his legal history, experiences in prison and Better Mousetrap Digital’s operations and business model. Daly likewise declined to comment about whether Better Mousetrap Digital clients are aware of his legal situation and whether he’s ever lost business because of it.

But when asked by NOTUS about their contracts with Daly’s Better Mousetrap Digital for fundraising and data services, several Republican political committees said they will stop, or have stopped, working with the firm.

Among them: the Republican National Committee, which has paid Better Mousetrap Digital more than $1 million since September 2023. This includes payments as recently as last month, on Sept. 17 and Sept. 30, totaling nearly $15,000 for a “list acquisition,” according to FEC records.

“Services from this vendor originated more than two years ago under a previous leadership team, and currently the RNC does not have an ongoing business relationship with them,” RNC Communications Director Zach Parkinson told NOTUS. “The RNC runs one of the largest digital fundraising operations in the conservative ecosystem, which regularly works with a wide range of outside vendors for services. All RNC activities are conducted in full compliance with the law.”

The Mullin Victory Fund — a joint fundraising committee composed of Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s Oklahoma campaign committee, the senator’s Boots Political Action Committee and the National Republican Senatorial Committee — has spent about $66,000 with Better Mousetrap Digital since September 2023, FEC records indicate.

The Mullin committee’s most recent payment to Daly’s firm came last month, on Sept. 30 — $4,969 for “list rental fees,” per FEC records.

“We were not aware of this, and will not use them moving forward,” Mullin’s campaign committee said in a statement to NOTUS when asked if it was aware of Daly’s legal history.

Meanwhile, the reelection campaign of Rep. Harriet Hageman, a Republican of Wyoming, has spent about $122,000 on “fundraising fees” with Better Mousetrap Digital since 2023, including more than 30 transactions this summer and autumn, according to FEC records through September.

When asked why it works with Daly’s company, Hageman’s campaign told NOTUS that “we have advised all vendors to cease any sub-vendor relationships with the referenced company.”

The 1776 Project PAC has paid Better Mousetrap Digital about $151,000 since September 2023, with its most recent payment coming on June 30, for “fundraising consulting agency fees” totaling about $111,000, according to the most recently available FEC records.

“The 1776 PAC has never spoken to Jack Daly,” PAC spokesperson Mitchell P. Jackson said. “He was a digital vendor that worked for a vendor, who we no longer work with. In other words, Daly was a vendor of a vendor that we no longer use.”

NOTUS attempted to contact more than three dozen other Republican political committees about their payments to Better Mousetrap Digital, which range from the low four figures to well into seven figures.

The federal-level committees of the Republican Party of Florida and West Virginia Republican Party acknowledged NOTUS’ inquiries but provided no answers to requests. The Republican state party committees in Arizona, California, Iowa, Minnesota and Texas, which also do business with Better Mousetrap Digital, did not respond to repeated messages.

Nor did several of Better Mousetrap Digital’s most lucrative federal clients, including the NRSC (more than $5.2 million in spending since September 2023), Trump National Committee JFC (nearly $3.6 million in spending) and the Trump Save America Joint Fundraising Committee (nearly $1 million).

Congressional reelection committees that have recently used Better Mousetrap Digital and that did not respond to requests for comment include those of Sens. Rick Scott of Florida, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Josh Hawley of Missouri and Bill Cassidy of Louisiana. The campaigns of Reps. Anna Paulina Luna, Cory Mills, Byron Donalds, Jimmy Patronis and Kat Cammack of Florida also did not respond, nor did those of Reps. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey and Ronny Jackson of Texas.

Better Mousetrap Digital also does some state-level political business. In New Jersey, for example, state campaign finance records indicate Republican political committee Elect Common Sense has spent more than $155,000 with Better Mousetrap Digital, mostly on “fundraising fees.” Kitchen Table Conservatives, a New Jersey super PAC in part led by former Trump aide Kellyanne Conway that’s supporting Republican gubernatorial candidate Jack Ciattarelli ahead of next week’s election, has spent more than $7,000.

On his LinkedIn page, Daly describes himself as a “prominent and prolific digital fundraiser for more than one thousand clients (GOP candidates/committees and conservative/MAGA causes)” and a “leading digital fundraiser for President Trump & Congressional Republicans.”

Better Mousetrap Digital describes itself as the “premier digital fundraising consulting firm for Republicans. With decades of experience spanning from state house campaigns to the White House, we bring unparalleled expertise and dedication to our clients.”

On its website, the firm advertises Donald Trump for President, the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the RNC as clients, alongside the committees’ logos.

Daly, who previously led digital fundraising firm Reach Right Digital Marketing LLC, per Virgin Islands corporate records, can trace his legal troubles back to 2017, the same year the Daily Caller published an article about Daly headlined, “How a shady super PAC convinced 20,000 conservatives to hand over their money.”

Prosecutors accused Daly and fellow attorney Nathanael Pendley of raising more than $1.6 million for a political committee, known as Draft PAC, that promised to convince Clarke, the former Milwaukee County sheriff, to run for U.S. Senate in Wisconsin ahead of the 2018 midterm election.

Clarke, who did not respond to requests for comment for this article, never ran for the Senate and maintained he never had intentions to do so, telling the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that Daly was operating a “scam PAC.” Federal prosecutors said Daly and Pendley kept fundraising anyway, in part for their personal benefit, and lied about their activities to federal officials.

In a letter to NOTUS, Sample — Daly’s attorney, who leads the Washington, D.C.-based Criminal Center LLC law firm — wrote that “a guilty plea is an admission only to the essential elements of the charged offense, and nothing more.”

While Daly “respects the freedom of the press,” Daly “will not tolerate the publication of any material that misrepresents the narrow scope of his plea, repeats as fact the government’s unproven and rejected allegations, or otherwise defames him,” Sample wrote.

Sample also emailed a copy of the transcript of Daly’s Dec. 15, 2025, sentencing hearing before U.S. District Court Judge J.P. Stadtmueller, with several passages highlighted.

Among them is a statement from Daly’s former attorney, Matthew Dean Krueger, that Daly’s crime is “a very limited offense.”

Krueger also told the court that “the government suggests that the defendants put each of these prospective donors at risk. No, it is the other way around. It’s the donor that put themselves at risk by subscribing or submitting a contribution.”

Daly is now in the midst of a monthslong court proceeding in which he is fighting to have his conviction vacated.

In a Sept. 30 request for an evidentiary hearing, Sample argues in a filing with the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Wisconsin that Daly received “substantively incorrect advice” from his previous attorneys and was in “profound turmoil over his plea” — and therefore unable to make a “knowing and intelligent decision during the critical window when his right to withdraw that plea was absolute.”

In his 2023 plea agreement, Daly “acknowledges, understands and agrees that he is, in fact, guilty of the offense” of which he was charged. “The defendant admits that these facts are true and correct and establish his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”

At Daly’s December 2023 sentencing hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin Knight argued that “Mr. Daly has pled guilty to a year-long criminal conspiracy to lie to the FEC and to defraud donors. So the idea that somehow it’s inaccurate to suggest that there’s a multi-year course of criminal conduct, that’s literally the offense of conviction. That is beyond dispute at this point, and any suggestion to the contrary should just be flatly rejected.”

This story was produced and originally published by NOTUS, a publication from the nonprofit, nonpartisan Allbritton Journalism Institute.

Fundraiser convicted of defrauding ‘vulnerable’ victims is back — and making millions from Republican campaigns is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Wearing his Milwaukee police uniform, Gregory Carson Jr. stepped into the witness stand, raised his right hand and swore to tell the truth.

Two years earlier, a man had been shot in an alley. His girlfriend said police pressured her to allow a search of the duplex as she held her infant. That search had turned up five guns, and now her boyfriend faced a federal charge.

On the stand that afternoon, a public defender asked Carson if he recalled making inappropriate statements to the girlfriend. Commenting on seeing her underwear on the floor? Reaching out to her hours later? Texting her?

Carson’s answer under oath to each question was the same.

No.

A few witnesses later, the girlfriend swore to tell the truth and read screenshots of text messages she had received.

Hey, it’s me. Honestly it was seeing your thong on the floor that had me like damn lol.

The woman replied to ask who was contacting her. She read the response in court: Hey it’s Carson from yesterday and I understand.

The officer had been caught in a lie.

At the time, Carson already was on the Milwaukee County district attorney’s list of officers with a history of credibility, integrity or bias concerns, commonly referred to as a “Brady/Giglio” list.

He also was under internal investigation for those same text messages. None of that was known to the defense attorney who questioned him. 

After that court hearing, Carson remained on the Milwaukee Police Department payroll for more than two years. In that period, he came under internal investigation three more times.

His nine-year career illustrates the risk of keeping such officers on the force and interacting with the public after their credibility and integrity have come under question. At least a dozen officers, including Carson, kept their jobs after landing on the Brady list, then ended up on the list again for another incident, an investigation by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, TMJ4 News and Wisconsin Watch found.

Reached in April, Carson declined an interview request. 

Police Chief Jeffrey Norman said Carson faced several allegations that overlapped in time and that the officer had due process and collective bargaining rights. Internal investigations can take months or even years to complete, the chief added.

“But we still have to remember, just as a court case, you are innocent until proven guilty,” Norman said in an interview in January.

Officers’ rights are important, but so is protecting public trust, said Justin Nix, associate professor of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Nebraska Omaha.

“Officers can arrest us, they can use force on us, and along with that comes a lot of responsibility to uphold certain values and to be honest,” Nix said in June. 

“When officers fail to meet those standards, in my mind, it’s unacceptable.”

Officer lands on Brady list after domestic violence arrest but keeps his job

Carson wanted a long career with the Milwaukee Police Department.

He started as a police aide.

He had relatives who were cops and he wanted to make a difference in his community, “busting down drug houses, getting guns off the streets,” he wrote to a supervisor in 2015.

“I am striving for success, and 25 years plus on the job,” he added.

He became a sworn officer in 2018. Two years later, his own department arrested him on a domestic violence allegation.

A woman had called for help, saying she wanted Carson to leave their shared residence. She had confronted him over infidelity suspicions, and then he held her against the couch and bit her cheek, she said. 

Police separated the two. Officer Roy Caul asked the woman about domestic violence incidents that had occurred at any time, not just that night in 2020.

“Just because he’s a cop doesn’t mean that he’s free to do this to you,” Caul said, according to transcripts from body camera footage. 

The woman said she just wanted Carson out of the house.

The officer asked if anything occurred that night or within the last 28 days to cause her pain or make her fear for her safety. The woman replied no.

Officers arrested Carson, already in uniform for his next shift, and took him to the training academy for further questioning. He denied hurting the woman.

The department referred the case to the district attorney’s office. Assistant District Attorney Nicolas Heitman declined to charge Carson. In a recent email to the Journal Sentinel, Heitman said the office did not feel it could meet the burden of proof with the available evidence.

Three months later, the woman told Internal Affairs she had not feared for her safety. Carson told Internal Affairs nothing physical happened.

“I feel that I didn’t do anything wrong,” he said, according to department records.

Norman, the chief, disagreed and gave Carson a three-day suspension. 

The arrest resulted in the district attorney’s office placing Carson on its list of officers with credibility or integrity issues, often called a “Brady/Giglio” list, named after two landmark U.S. Supreme Court rulings. 

These lists are maintained to help prosecutors fulfill their legal obligations to share information favorable to the defense. Often, criminal cases come down to the word of an officer against a defendant. Judges and juries must weigh the credibility of both.

With Carson’s name added to the list, prosecutors would need to disclose his criminal referral and integrity violation to defense attorneys if he appeared on their witness list. 

Then it would be up to a defense attorney, and later a judge, to determine if it was relevant to bring up in court.

Carson kept his job, his badge and his ability to testify.

Wisconsin does not have statewide standards for Brady lists, leaving it to each county to track material

Until recently, the county’s full Brady list was kept secret.

After months of pressure from media organizations, the district attorney’s office released the entire list last September. It was inaccurate, inconsistent and incomplete, an investigation by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, TMJ4 News and Wisconsin Watch found.

As a result of reporters’ questions, District Attorney Kent Lovern removed officers and added others. His office released a corrected and updated list of nearly 200 officers in February, which was published by the Journal Sentinel and media partners.

Who gets on a list – and whether counties even have a list – varies widely in Wisconsin, where there are no statewide standards. Officers can testify in multiple counties or in federal court, depending on the case and where an investigation leads. 

Federal prosecutors, however, have standardized U.S. Department of Justice guidelines. Prosecutors are supposed to ask law enforcement witnesses directly about potential Brady material and check with officers’ home agencies. 

“This process is designed to identify information that is even broader in scope than what is legally required and what might trigger being on a list in another jurisdiction,” said Kenneth Gales, a spokesman with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Milwaukee, in an email.

Gales maintained the office followed all proper procedures prior to Carson’s testimony in the federal hearing.

Even if a formal list is not shared by prosecutors, state and federal public defenders in eastern Wisconsin often exchange information between their offices about the credibility of law enforcement witnesses.

Criminal defense attorneys in Wisconsin say inconsistencies in disclosing Brady material can lead to injustice and wrongful convictions.

Such information is crucial for an effective defense, said Bridget Krause, trial division director for the State Public Defender’s Office.

“Our clients have liberty at stake,” she said.

In shooting case, a witness says officer made inappropriate comments in person and through texts

In late 2021, the Milwaukee Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division received a letter from a prisoner at Kettle Moraine Correctional Institution.

In it, a man accused officers of illegally searching his house during a shooting investigation. 

It was the call involving Carson. 

Internal Affairs opened an investigation and notified Carson, saying he was accused of taking part in an illegal search and failing to activate his body camera. 

A third allegation read that “while on scene, you made inappropriate comments to a female citizen as well as sending her an inappropriate text message,” according to paperwork served on Carson on March 1, 2022.

Seven days later at the court hearing, Carson denied knowing anything about the texts.

He also defended his decision to turn off his body camera, saying he had switched off the device to speak with other officers, who did the same. No one recorded the conversation detectives had with the woman about searching the home.

“My role in the investigation was over once the detectives were on scene inside the residence,” Carson said, according to a court transcript.

When the man’s girlfriend testified, she said she felt pressured to allow the search after an officer mentioned child welfare. She feared her baby would be taken away. She also said that Carson had flirted with her in the house.

When the prosecutor asked her to elaborate, she quoted Carson as saying: “Oh, you might as well kiss your man goodbye, because you ain’t never going to see him again.”

She also remembered this comment: “I’m going to come back and see you later, okay? You going to let me in? It’s just going to be me and you.”

As the hearing closed, Joshua Uller, a federal public defender, sharpened his argument that officers had acted improperly and their search was not lawful.

Carson and others violated department policy when they didn’t record their interaction with the woman as she signed the consent form. They treated a shooting victim as a suspect without evidence to do so, and Carson had acted completely inappropriately, he said.

“Turning a woman with a newborn child whose boyfriend was just taken away in an ambulance into a romantic objective is really beyond the pale,” Uller said, according to a transcript.

Later that month, Magistrate Judge Stephen C. Dries issued his report and recommendation. Though he chided officers for failing to record the woman signing the form, he concluded they had properly gotten her consent and the search was legal.

Carson’s testimony on the text messages, he said, was not credible.

Officer, already on the Brady list, tries to dissuade a woman from filing a complaint against another officer

Two days after the hearing, an internal investigator questioned Carson about the text messages.

He admitted to sending them, contradicting his testimony. 

He said he had a “weakness” and had contacted the woman in “romantic pursuit,” department records say.

“In no way shape or form did I ever intend to be inappropriate or disrespect her in that manner,” he said, according to the records. “It was honestly me trying to shoot my shot and that was it.”

He denied making inappropriate comments to her in person and denied using his position as a police officer as an advantage. He said he regretted it and had learned a lesson.

He never mentioned his false testimony. At this point, federal prosecutors had not notified the police department of any concerns.

About three months after that interview, Carson had another troubling interaction with a woman he met on duty when she and her ex-boyfriend walked into District 7 on the city’s north side.

The former couple had a heated property dispute. The woman also said the man had intentionally hit her head while closing a car door. The man said it was an accident.

Carson was one of four officers dealing with the situation.

The woman grew frustrated with an officer who implied she was lying about the car door injury and refused to write a report about the incident. Police cited the man for battery.

Hours later, the woman received a call from a blocked number. 

It was Carson.

He explained who he was and said he was off-duty. He pleaded with her not to file a complaint against his co-worker who had implied she was lying, according to police records. All of the officers involved were “good guys” who could only do so much, she remembered him saying.

She also recalled Carson saying that he hoped she would leave her ex-boyfriend alone because he did not want the ex “popping up at her house” while Carson was there, which she believed to be a flirtatious comment.

The next day, she filed two complaints at District 7: one against the officer who implied she lied and one against Carson.

In a recent interview with the Journal Sentinel, the woman called the actions of the officers that day “extremely disheartening.”

“When you’re going through one of the toughest times of your life, the last thing you should have to deal with is them approaching you in a sexual manner or accusing you of lying when you’re literally crying out for help,” said the woman, who asked not to be named publicly for privacy and safety reasons.

Internal Affairs classified her complaint against Carson as potential misconduct in office and assigned a detective to investigate.

A federal prosecutor tells the Milwaukee Police Department an officer gave false testimony in court

That summer, the federal case involving the shooting victim and Carson’s texts continued.

The defense attorney asked another judge to weigh in on the legality of the search. 

As prosecutors prepared for another hearing in July 2022, Assistant U.S. Attorney Megan Paulson reached out to Carson about his prior testimony. 

She then wrote a memo summarizing their conversation, in which she said Carson admitted to sending the texts and not being truthful in his testimony, adding: “I’m human and I’m attracted to women.”

On July 6, 2022, Assistant U.S. Attorney Tim Funnell emailed Internal Affairs with concerns about Carson’s credibility. He followed up the next day with a transcript from the March hearing, the earlier judge’s report and the defense motion for a second evidentiary hearing. 

Asked about the case and the length of time it took the U.S. Attorney’s Office to contact Milwaukee police, a spokesman for the office said prosecutors acted appropriately.

“The United States also timely satisfied all legal disclosure obligations to the Court and to the defense in the matter you have referenced,” Gales said in an email. 

Carson was on the county’s Brady list of officers with credibility issues — he had been since 2021 — but Uller, the federal public defender, said he had never seen the county’s Brady list until the Journal Sentinel and other media partners published it in February.

“While I cannot comment on this particular case, I am not aware of any instance in which, prior to the publication of this list, a lawyer in our office was notified of an officer’s inclusion in this list,” he said.

The Journal Sentinel tried to contact the woman who received the texts but was not successful. Her then-boyfriend charged in the case died in a shooting two years ago.

After hearing from the federal prosecutor in July 2022, Internal Affairs opened an investigation into Carson’s false testimony.

Carson was now the subject of three pending internal investigations, had previously received a three-day suspension and was on the county’s Brady list.  

Still, he remained on patrol.

“At the time, it’s an allegation,” Norman, the police chief, said in an interview.

“We have, again, due process,” he added. “And so we need to make sure that there is, you know, the fairness of ensuring that there is credibility to everything, even from a prosecutor.”

A domestic violence victim calls for help, and an officer under internal investigation responds

Bobbie Lou Schoeffling called 911 for help on July 11, 2022.

Over the previous months, Schoeffling or her sister had repeatedly called police to report violence from Schoeffling’s ex-boyfriend, Nicholas Howell. Howell had not been arrested despite the multiple reports, having an open warrant for fleeing and being under the supervision of correctional agents for a past robbery conviction.

That night, Schoeffling called police twice to report threats from Howell. On the second call, she said he had threatened to burn down her house on Hampton Avenue. She had left the area, fearing for her safety, she added.

Carson and his partner were dispatched to the second call. They did not drive to her house. Instead, Carson spoke to her over the phone and failed to activate his body camera to record their conversation.

Carson and his partner — and the two officers who responded earlier that night — did not file any reports or make any arrests.

Schoeffling was found shot to death two weeks later, on July 26. 

On Sept. 4, 2022, police leaders finally pulled Carson from patrol, stripped him of his police powers and assigned him to the stolen vehicle desk in the forensics division. 

He did not routinely interact with the public in the role, and the job limited him from having to testify, a department spokesperson said in an email to the Journal Sentinel.

As internal investigations conclude, officer faces a suspension, then termination

As Carson sat at his desk job, his discipline piled up.

In February 2023, Norman suspended him for six days for the inappropriate texts and for failing to activate his body camera at the shooting scene.

Two months later, in April, the Journal Sentinel published an investigation into Schoeffling’s death. The article prompted Norman to order a review of every contact she had with the department, including the one involving Carson. The chief later suspended Carson for eight days for how he handled the call.

That same month, Internal Affairs interviewed Carson about the complaint filed by the woman at District 7. That investigation had slowed, in part, because it was difficult to reach the woman for follow-up interviews, records show.

The woman told the Journal Sentinel that she recalled speaking to an investigator once after filing her complaint and said she received several letters from the department.

Carson told the investigator, Sgt. Adam Riley, that when he called the woman, he did not say anything suggestive, only that she was worth more than her ex-boyfriend, according to department records. He acknowledged urging her not to make a complaint.

Riley pointed out the officer appeared to have a “pattern.”

Riley asked about Carson’s court testimony in the earlier case, pointing out he knew about the allegation related to the texts before his testimony. Carson said he thought he was truthful on the stand because he did not remember the text at the time.

Carson also said the federal prosecutor who wrote the memo had “misinterpreted” their conversation. Riley asked if Carson would have done anything differently. 

No, he said.

Federal and state prosecutors declined to file criminal charges of perjury or misconduct against Carson.

But the district attorney’s office did add him to the Brady list for a second time — and the false testimony cost him his job.

Norman fired him for lying under oath and for discouraging the woman at District 7 from making a complaint. 

Carson’s discharge date was Aug. 28, 2024, three years after he was first placed on the Brady list in the aftermath of his domestic violence arrest.

The woman who filed the complaint against Carson and the other officer at District 7 knew Carson had been fired. Still, she has concerns about how the department investigates misconduct allegations.

“I think it’s not handled appropriately or quickly enough,” she said.

Tia Schoeffling, Bobbie Lou Schoeffling’s sister, called it “ridiculous” that an officer arrested in such a case could then respond to domestic violence victims.

She thought of Carson on desk duty for two years, collecting nearly $80,000 in annual wages while he was the subject of several ongoing internal investigations.

She questioned if it would have taken that long to investigate a regular citizen for similar allegations. 

“It’s mind-blowing that he was even allowed to respond to her call,” she said.

This story is part of Duty to Disclose, an investigation by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, TMJ4 News and Wisconsin Watch. The Fund for Investigative Journalism provided financial support for this project.

Already flagged for integrity concerns, a Milwaukee police officer lied under oath – and kept patrolling is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

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Last week’s storms destroyed Sabrena Henderson’s Milwaukee home, leaving her family displaced. 

Not only did the basement of her Garden Homes rental unit flood, destroying her washer, dryer and freezer, but the heavy rains collapsed her ceiling.

While she does have renters insurance, she said, it’s been a long process of trying to apply for assistance, file claims and figure out next steps. 

“It’s only thanks to my family that we are not homeless,” she said. “But we can’t stay in our house, and we are waiting for the landlord to do their part.” 

Additionally, Henderson is a breast cancer survivor who is still in cancer care and should not be anywhere near her home. Mold buildup could be dangerous for her immune system, she said, making cleanup another major concern.

Henderson’s family is one of thousands trying to put their lives back together.  

Impact

Two American Red Cross shelters have been set up in Milwaukee at Holler Park, 5151 S. 6th St., and Washington Senior Center, 4420 W. Vliet St., to assist temporarily displaced individuals.

Jennifer Warren, the regional communications director with the Red Cross, said on Sunday, Aug. 18, the shelters housed 39 people. 

She said since the shelter has been set up, the Red Cross has served over 1,400 meals and snacks. Workers handed out 3,400 emergency relief supplies.

Vickie Boneck, the director of marketing and communications with IMPACT 211, a central access point for people in need, said her organization is supporting local emergency management offices by collecting reports of property damage caused by flooding.

Days after the storm, calls for flood-related assistance continue. 

As of the afternoon of Aug. 18, over 16,500 flood-related service requests had been made to 211 from Milwaukee County and the surrounding counties of Waukesha, Ozaukee and Washington. About 85% of those requests originated from Milwaukee County alone.

According to 211 data, the highest concentration of service requests came from Milwaukee County’s Northwest Side and the West Milwaukee area, particularly from ZIP codes 53218, 53209 and 53216.

ZIP code 53218, where Henderson’s home falls, reported the most significant impact, with 1,851 damage reports. It also led in utility disruptions, with 2,562 reports, and had over 850 reports of structural damage.

Of the data collected, approximately 6,000 referrals were for storm-related assistance, helping connect residents to county emergency services, disaster food programs, cleanup supplies and other recovery resources.

What’s next

Milwaukee County’s disaster teams are assessing damage. The Salvation Army has teams out handing out water and snacks to those impacted. 

Benny Benedict, the emergency disaster services director for the Salvation Army of Milwaukee County, said people are still trying to understand the full impact of the floods. 

“It takes a while to figure out basically what you’re dealing with, and it seems that this flood is definitely very significant,” Benedict said. 

Teams from partner agencies are also on site to help residents clean homes and basements. 

Both the Salvation Army and the American Red Cross are accepting monetary contributions to help those impacted as on-site donations are too much to manage at the moment. 

“Today it might be the masks that everyone needs, and then we get thousands of them, and next thing you don’t know, the need is baby formula, and all we have are masks,” he said. “So the monetary donation, we don’t have to sort it, it’s very fluid, and the Salvation Army takes great care in making sure that we’re just meeting the critical needs.” 

Benedict said in his experience, this will be a case of long-term recovery for many of those impacted. 

“Preliminary numbers are showing that there is a significant number of destroyed homes,” he said. “So, we know that the unmet needs are going to be quite large. 
That could be everything from just cleanup kits, flood kits, help getting the house mucked out, basically rebuilding, and then there’s going to be needs for household items that were destroyed.”

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How to get help

Residents who wish to report property damage may contact IMPACT 211 and speak to a community resource specialist. That is also the best way to access information and referral to programs and services that may help in the aftermath of this storm. If people just want to report property damage, the best way is to complete the online form 211 Wisconsin.

Thousands of Milwaukee residents still feel effects of storm wreckage is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.