Charges against two individuals arrested during Michigan State University's Welcome Week in downtown East Lansing have been dropped.
Heavy crowds and fighting led to 52 calls to police during the weekend in late August as students arrived.
In one encounter with officers, Lonnie Smith and Mason Woods were arrested and charged with disturbing the peace and disorderly fighting among other misdemeanors.
As more security camera footage has emerged, the department’s narrative about the events leading up to those arrests have been called into question and those charges have been dropped.
The incident has kicked off a wave of criticism for the department and calls for Chief Jen Brown to resign.
The President of the Lansing NAACP wants the police department to remove the arrest records and issue a retraction and correction to the press release announcing the charges.
Smith’s mother, Nadia Sellers, told WKAR News Wednesday she’s happy the “city finally did the right thing.”
“But we’re just getting started,” Sellers said. “There’s still a lot to be done. There was a lot of pain and suffering for these two individuals.”
