On May 13, 2025, the Milwaukee Common Council approved a $6.96 million dollar settlement in what is the second largest wrongful conviction settlement in Milwaukee history.
The Plaintiff in the case, Danny Wilber is an Indigenous Black man who was arrested in January of 2004 for a murder that he did not commit, and spent the next 18 years of his life wrongfully imprisoned while he fought to establish his innocence. After his release, he brought this lawsuit against the Milwaukee Police Department detectives who conspired to frame him and against the MPD for its systemic practices designed to wrongfully prosecute and convict.
According to Danny Wilber:
This settlement clearly establishes what I have truthfully maintained at all times–that I was completely innocent and that it was physically impossible that I committed this murder. The evidence that came out in this case showed that this was not a series of mistakes by a squad of incompetent detectives. No, it was a conscious plan to construct a false case against me with manufactured witness statements in order to put me behind bars. It was a plan that they have used again and again against Black, Indigenous and other poor people of color. In this case, like in many others, the prosecutors and the Court system were, from beginning to end, vindictively complicit in my wrongful conviction and incarceration. This settlement delivers a measure of justice against the police who framed me, but what about the prosecutor who presented the false evidence at trial? What about the Judge who allowed it and violated my constitutional rights? What about the Assistant Attorney General who fought for years to keep me in a cage after my conviction was overturned and took the case all the way up to the Supreme Court of the United States? They’re all complicit and because of the corrupt system, they get to walk away, free to repeat the egregious misconduct under the guise of due process.
Attorneys Ben Elson and Flint Taylor of the People’s Law Office in Chicago who represent Danny Wilber, added:
The City of Milwaukee knows very well that Danny Wilber is innocent and that he was framed by Milwaukee police detectives, otherwise it wouldn’t be paying him $7 million. Instead of passing the blame onto others, the City should publicly acknowledge its role in Danny Wilber’s wrongful conviction and make a sincere apology.
Click HERE to read more about Danny Wibler’s case
