City of Memphis, Michigan puts whole police department on paid leave

An entire local police department is on paid leave. The small town of Memphis loses its local police force after the city council decided to shut it down temporarily.

Welcome to the quaint city of Memphis - the motto, "A pleasant place to live." The small, old fashion city, only covers a little more than a square mile, situated right on the border of Macomb and St. Clair counties.

"I called an emergency meeting (Thursday) and I asked council to suspend operations at the police department, “said Mayor Eric Schneider.

The problem is the lack of a good police chief. In the past 18 months, one chief had to be fired, another demoted, then on Jan. 1, Chief Kevin Sommers died of a heart attack after only four months on the job.

"He was here for such a short time that he never had the chance to find a person that would step in," Schneider said. "So we were in turmoil. Nobody knew who is in charge. There was lack of communication between City Hall the council and myself."

A sign on the door of the police department says it's closed until further notice, it's six police officers are on paid leave until a new chief can be found.

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The racial makeup of the city was 97.6% White, 0.8%African American, 0.3% Native American, 0.5% from other races, and 0.8% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.1% of the population.