LANSING — Fix a traffic ticket; get promoted.
That's how it's working out for one Michigan State Police lieutenant, records the Detroit Free Press obtained under the state's Freedom of Information Act show.
Lt. Tarzza (T.J.) Williams will be promoted to first lieutenant on Oct. 11, when he takes over as commander of the Metro South Post in Taylor, MSP spokeswoman Lori Dougovito confirmed Oct. 5. That's despite an internal affairs investigation finding that Williams abused his authority and falsified MSP records in July by improperly accessing an MSP database and voiding a valid traffic ticket on behalf of a friend, records obtained through FOIA show.
The ticket fixing incident raises questions about how often Michiganders who have connections can
make a traffic citation "disappear." The subsequent promotion of Williams, which conflicts with broad MSP policy, also fuels a longstanding controversy about personnel practices under the MSP director, Col. James Grady.
"It's simply another extension of his rogue DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) policy, ignoring civil service rules," said Ann Arbor attorney James Fett, who has litigated several past and current cases in which white MSP officers have alleged Grady, who like Williams is Black, has unlawfully promoted Black officers in an effort to diversify the predominantly white upper ranks of the MSP.
Fett, who represents Lt. Mandy Coy, a white woman turned down for the promotion Williams received, said he's handled MSP personnel cases for decades and has never seen a settlement agreement that allowed a recently suspended officer to be promoted. "It's unbelievable," Fett said.
However, Paul Pummill, who as executive director of the Michigan State Police Command Officers Association signed a settlement agreement that spelled out the discipline Williams received, denied Grady's involvement in an Oct. 6 text message to the Free Press.
"Col. Grady had no involvement at any stage of the negotiations or the final settlement agreement, that I'm aware of," said Pummill, who is white and as a union leader has been a vocal critic of Grady and his allegedly discriminatory personnel practices. He declined further comment.
Dougovito said in an Oct. 6 email that the investigation into Williams' voiding of the ticket was not completed when he interviewed for the promotion and, as a result, "policy required that he receive full consideration." The determination that Williams should be suspended for five days was reached before the promotion process was concluded, so a clause in the settlement agreement was used to preserve his eligibility, she said. Since then, Grady "has requested a (policy) revision so that disciplinary matters that reach completion before the hiring process concludes will be factored into the process," she said.
The ticket, for using a handheld cellphone while driving, was issued in Saginaw County July 4 to a woman whose father was close friends with Williams and Det. Trooper Jason Bledsoe, according to internal affairs records. Williams was spending the holiday weekend at Bledsoe's lake home when he overheard Bledsoe talking on the phone to a sergeant at the Tri-City Post in Freeland, asking "what options would be available to make the citation go away," records show.
Williams then used his work laptop to access an internal MSP system, called iyeTek, and voided the ticket the same day it was issued, according to an internal affairs report.
That action led to an internal affairs investigation and a five-day suspension for Williams, who had a previous written reprimand on his record from 2023, under a Sept. 9 settlement agreement, records show. Williams satisfied the suspension by forfeiting 40 hours of "comp time," which is time off granted for extra hours worked, records show.
It's not clear how common it is for MSP officials to access the agency's internal database and void a traffic citation. Dougovito did not immediately respond to Oct. 6 questions about how often that happens, how many officers have the authority to void tickets, and what legitimate reasons officers can give for voiding a ticket. Records received through FOIA show that officers who void a ticket leave their names on the database as having made the change, along with a stated reason. The reason Williams gave for voiding the July 4 ticket was one word: "Information."
Williams, who didn't even work in the same MSP district where the ticket was issued, did not respond to an Oct. 5 email seeking comment.
The unidentified sergeant who Bledsoe spoke with told investigators he reached out to the trooper who wrote the ticket, records show. The trooper said he was willing to "work with" the court and the woman to resolve the ticket, but it needed to go through the process and the woman should request an informal hearing, according to the internal affairs reports.
On July 6, the sergeant got a call from the trooper, asking "what was going on," after the trooper found that the ticket had already been voided in the system, records show. The trooper was "pretty disgruntled" that a lieutenant from another district had voided one of his tickets, according to the report.
It's not clear from the records whether Bledsoe was also disciplined. He did not respond to an Oct. 5 email seeking comment. The MSP redacted from the records provided under FOIA the statements that both Williams and Bledsoe gave to investigators.
The MSP also redacted the names of the trooper who wrote the ticket, the woman who received the ticket, the woman's father, and the sergeant Bledsoe spoke to when he was overheard by Williams.
Under a 2022 MSP policy order, officers who receive discipline that includes a suspension are ineligible for promotion for two years after the discipline is imposed, records show. The order allows for an exception to the prohibition on promotions when provided for under a settlement agreement. The Sept. 9 settlement agreement with Williams says he would "remain selection eligible."
The MSP recently selected Williams to command the Taylor post, with a promotion to first lieutenant, filling a vacancy created by a transfer.
In January, Williams sued the MSP in the Michigan Court of Claims, alleging he was wrongly denied promotion to 1st lieutenant at the Flint post in 2025 because the inspector who interviewed him had an undisclosed bias against him and a conflict of interest. That case is still pending.
In that suit, Williams alleges that Insp. Fahad Qureshi was biased against him because Qureshi's wife, former MSP Insp. Sarah Krebs, accused Williams of forcibly kissing her in front of other officers after a dinner at an MSP conference in Detroit in December 2024. That incident also prompted an internal affairs investigation but did not result in discipline, records show.
Asked why Pummill would sign an agreement that Fett alleges is a furtherance of allegedly discriminatory promotion practices Pummill has criticized, Fett said that as a union leader, Pummill had an obligation to negotiate the best settlement he could for Williams.
Pummill said in the Oct. 6 text message that his association "provides the best representation for all of our members."
Fett and several of the lawsuits allege that Grady has pursued discriminatory promotion practices to comply with an alleged directive from Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to diversify the MSP and its upper ranks.
Whitmer called for state government to be inclusive in a 2019 executive directive in which she spoke out against discrimination and said "the diversity of Michigan’s people is one of our state’s greatest strengths." She has voiced support for Grady in the face of non-confidence votes by two MSP unions and calls for his resignation from Republican lawmakers. But she has not directly responded to allegations that she directed Grady to increase the diversity of the MSP or its upper ranks.
The Free Press obtained records that show at least one other incident of an MSP officer improperly voiding a traffic ticket.
In 2025, an MSP officer contacted another officer who had written the first officer's friend a traffic ticket and voided the ticket after first requesting permission from the officer who wrote the ticket, according to a Dec. 5, 2025 MSP employee relations bulletin obtained by the Free Press from multiple sources. That officer received a three-day suspension, according to the bulletin.
Contact Paul Egan: 517-372-8660 or pegan@freepress.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: MSP lieutenant promoted after abusing authority to fix traffic ticket
