Michigan appeals court vacates terrorism conviction in Whitmer kidnapping case, citing flaw in state law

A state appeals court Tuesday vacated the terrorism-related convictions of a Wolverine Watchmen member tied to the 2020 plot to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, ruling that kidnapping does not qualify as a “violent felony” under Michigan’s anti-terrorism law and ordering a new trial.

The Michigan Court of Appeals threw out all three of Joseph Matthew Morrison’s convictions in its binding opinion.

The ruling turns on a 2006 change to the state’s kidnapping statute. To support a terrorism conviction, the underlying offense must be a “violent felony,” which Michigan law defines as a crime that includes the use, attempted use or threatened use of physical force. When lawmakers amended the statute in 2006, they removed every reference to force, the court said. As a result, kidnapping no longer meets that definition.

“Because the ‘use, attempted use or threatened use of physical force’ is not an element of kidnapping, kidnapping is not a ‘violent felony,’” Judge Mark Boonstra wrote for the panel.

The decision now sets a statewide precedent and identifies what the court described as an apparent gap in the law that only the state Legislature can fix. The same legal reasoning could affect the convictions of Morrison’s co-defendants.

At trial, the judge instructed jurors that kidnapping was among the “violent felonies” that could serve as the basis for a terrorism conviction, alongside murder, assault with intent to commit murder, assault with intent to do great bodily harm and arson. The verdict form asked only whether Morrison was guilty of providing material support for an act of terrorism, not which underlying crime the jury relied on.

Read more: WLNS