Detroit journalist Charlie LeDuff charged with domestic violence against wife

Longtime Detroit journalist Charlie LeDuff is charged with domestic violence in an incident Monday involving his wife at their Oakland County home.

Judge Jaimie Powell Horowitz of 45th District Court allowed LeDuff to be released on $5,000 personal bond. He can't contact his wife or go back to their shared home in Pleasant Ridge under the terms of his release.

LeDuff stood mute during his Tuesday arraignment. His lawyer, Todd Perkins, entered a not guilty plea on his behalf.

"This is a man that loves his family," Perkins told the Free Press after the hearing. He said he and his client are trying to keep the matter "as private as possible."

Pleasant Ridge Interim Police Chief Robert Ried confirmed to the Free Press that police were called to LeDuff's home around 9:30 p.m. Monday. He said LeDuff allegedly assaulted someone at the home, but would not confirm the victim's identity. LeDuff was then arrested and taken to the Berkley police station, where he stayed overnight, Ried said. LeDuff was released on bond shortly after his arraignment Tuesday afternoon.

LeDuff is the host of a weekly podcast, "No BS News Hour With Charlie LeDuff."

He's a controversial print and TV journalist known for unconventional reporting, often infused with opinion and his own personality and often putting local politicians in his crosshairs. He's worked for the New York Times, the Detroit News, Fox 2 and other outlets.

He was fired in October as a columnist at the Detroit News after using a coded insult toward Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel on the social media platform X, where he wrote "See you next Tuesday" (typically spelled “C U Next Tuesday" as a pejorative).

LeDuff told the Detroit Metro Times he thought the insult was "clever," given that his weekly column at the Detroit News was published on Tuesdays.

The tagline for the last column he wrote for the Detroit News, dated Oct. 17, said his column appeared on Wednesdays.

“I’m not apologizing. I have nothing to apologize for. … I stand by it,” he told the Metro Times.

Early in his career, LeDuff apologized for plagiarism after lifting passages from a nonfiction book.

He won a Pulitzer Prize in 2001 as a contributor to the New York Times' "How Race Is Lived In America" series.

In 2012, he was sued over a story by Cindy Pasky, president and CEO of Strategic Staffing Solutions, while working for Fox 2. The station and Pasky settled; the station retracted the story and issued an on-air apology.

LeDuff was accused in 2013 of urinating in public and then biting a security guard during Detroit's St. Patrick's Day parade, though charges were never filed.

In recent years, LeDuff has been accused of using right-wing rhetoric to attract a conservative fanbase, a claim he denied during an appearance this month on Detroit Free Press investigative columnist M.L. Elrick's podcast, "ML's Soul of Detroit."

Andrea Sahouri covers criminal justice for the Detroit Free Press. She can be contacted at 313-264-0442 or asahouri@freepress.com.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Charlie LeDuff charged with domestic violence against wife