Critics of Grand Traverse County Prosecutor Noelle Moeggenberg say she should be recalled, and they gathered at the Traverse Area District Library last night to explain why.
About 50 people listened as speakers criticized the prosecutor as soft on crime and laid out plans for her recall.
One of the speakers was Brenda DeKuiper, whose son was killed in a car accident in 2024.
“Right off the bat we said we do not want any plea deals,” DeKuiper said.
But the driver received a plea deal from the prosecutor’s office, which included reckless driving causing injury, but not death.
Light plea deals and sentencing were echoed by the two other speakers.
DeKuiper said the idea for the group came together after she read of another speaker's story, Andrea Flowers, in the Traverse City Record-Eagle.
That reporting hit the newspaper's front page in December and told the story of Flowers' 4-year-old granddaughter who had been the victim of sexual abuse.
In that story, Flowers said she was "blindsided" by Moeggenberg's decision to plead the case down from original charges of first-degree criminal sexual conduct to the lesser charge of one count of assault with intent to commit sexual penetration.
Moeggenberg said she was frustrated by that coverage and called it incomplete.
She spoke to IPR by phone after the meeting on Monday night, which she said she watched via livestream.
She said there's a lot of misunderstanding, especially about how much say she gets in sentencing.
“There was a comment about somebody getting (sentenced to) zero to 9 months. Those all have to do with sentencing guidelines that are set by the legislature," she said. "So I guess people think I have a lot more power than I do.”
Moeggenberg's said her biggest concern is that victims of sexual or physical abuse will not come forward as a result of a loss of trust in the office because of the recall effort.
The group’s petition to recall Moeggenberg is currently awaiting approval from the state’s Board of Canvassers. If approved, supporters would need to gather around 14,000 valid signatures to put the recall question in front of voters.
