Few federal trial courts combine the Western District of Michigan’s range: a Grand Rapids courthouse that hosted one of the most closely watched domestic-terrorism prosecutions of the decade, a firearms docket running more than twice the national rate, a state-capital courthouse in Lansing, and a Marquette outpost serving the entire Upper Peninsula. Anyone facing a federal investigation or charge anywhere in this sprawling district — from Kalamazoo to Keweenaw — needs counsel who understand both the law and the court applying it.
Here we map the district for you: its four courthouses, its compact bench, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the cases it actually brings, and the appellate and post-conviction roads that follow judgment. Elizabeth Franklin-Best, P.C. defends federal cases nationwide and appears in this district through pro hac vice admission. Best Lawyers in America 2026 recognizes Elizabeth Franklin-Best as a “Best Lawyer” in Appellate Practice, and Chambers USA 2026 ranks her for Litigation: White-Collar Crime & Government Investigations — credentials earned in precisely the high-stakes federal work a WDMI case can become. This page is part of our federal courts directory.
If your federal problem has a Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Lansing, or Marquette caption on it, our paid, one-hour initial consultation gives you what the situation actually calls for: a clear-eyed read of the charges, the court, and the choices in front of you.
Table of Contents
Quick Answer: Western District of Michigan
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| What does the Western District of Michigan cover? | The western half of the Lower Peninsula plus every county of the Upper Peninsula. Staffed courthouses sit in Grand Rapids (headquarters, in the Gerald R. Ford Federal Building), Kalamazoo, Lansing, and Marquette — the U.P.’s own federal courthouse. |
| Who prosecutes federal cases there? | The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Michigan in Grand Rapids — the office that brought the Whitmer kidnapping-plot prosecutions. As of mid-2026, Timothy VerHey serves as U.S. Attorney under a district-court appointment (28 U.S.C. § 546(d), effective November 18, 2025), holding the post until a Senate-confirmed successor takes office; he has been nominated but not yet confirmed. |
| Which circuit hears appeals? | The Sixth Circuit. A Marquette conviction travels more than 500 miles to its Cincinnati review — the longest road to the courthouse anywhere in the circuit, governed by the same precedent as every other mile of it. |
| Where are post-conviction motions filed? | A Section 2255 motion attacking a WDMI judgment comes back to this court. There is no federal prison inside the district — Michigan’s only BOP facility, FCI Milan, sits in the Eastern District — so Section 2241 custody petitions are filed wherever the prisoner is actually held. |
| Can the firm appear in this court? | Yes. We take WDMI matters through pro hac vice admission, covering the case from first appearance through Sixth Circuit appeal and post-conviction litigation. |
Key Takeaways
- The district reaches from Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids through Lansing to the whole Upper Peninsula, with staffed courthouses in Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Lansing, and Marquette per the court’s own locations page as of mid-2026.
- The bench is compact: the court’s judicial directory lists four district judges — Chief Judge Hala Y. Jarbou (chambers in Lansing), Paul L. Maloney (Kalamazoo), Robert J. Jonker, and Jane M. Beckering (Grand Rapids) — plus four magistrate judges, one of them resident in Marquette for the U.P.
- U.S. Sentencing Commission data show 226 people sentenced in fiscal year 2024 — and a firearms share of 28.3%, more than double the 13.2% national figure and the highest in the Sixth Circuit’s Michigan-Kentucky group.
- Sexual-abuse offenses ran 8.4% of FY2024 sentencings against 2.3% nationally, a reflection of the federal jurisdiction that follows this district’s geography, and fraud cases reached 14.6%.
- This is the court that tried the Whitmer kidnapping-plot cases: two defendants pleaded guilty, two were acquitted at the first trial in 2022, and the two retried — convicted of kidnapping and weapons-of-mass-destruction conspiracies — received sentences of 16 years and 235 months per the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
- As of mid-2026 Timothy VerHey serves as U.S. Attorney by appointment of the district court’s judges under 28 U.S.C. § 546(d) (effective November 18, 2025); nominated for the office but not yet Senate-confirmed, he holds it until a confirmed successor is sworn in.
- After United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024), Second Amendment challenges to the firearms statutes are alive but fact-intensive — consequential in a district where more than one sentencing in four is a gun case.
- Fourteen days is all Rule 4(b) gives to notice an appeal from entry of judgment; distance is no excuse, so we file from wherever we are and never let geography spend the clock.
- Compassionate-release outcomes here demand realism: WDMI judges granted 2 of 57 motions decided in fiscal year 2025 (3.5%) — one of the heaviest motion volumes in the circuit, and among its lowest grant rates.
- We appear in this district pro hac vice and pair every trial-level engagement with the appellate and post-conviction depth our practice is built on.
The Western District of Michigan at a Glance
The United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan covers the western half of the Lower Peninsula and all of the Upper Peninsula — a territory that takes the better part of a day to drive end to end. Headquarters is the Gerald R. Ford Federal Building in Grand Rapids, with staffed courthouses in Kalamazoo, Lansing (where the chief judge keeps chambers, blocks from the state capitol), and Marquette, the Upper Peninsula’s federal seat, where a resident magistrate judge handles the front end of U.P. cases.
Every prosecution here belongs to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Michigan, working from Grand Rapids. Review of the court’s judgments belongs to the Sixth Circuit — whose published opinions in this district’s highest-profile cases show how much appellate craft ends up mattering long after a Grand Rapids jury goes home.
Day to day, the court runs on the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and its own Local Rules — but the geography adds wrinkles the rulebooks do not: which courthouse a case calls home determines travel logistics for detained clients, witness availability, and even how quickly an in-person hearing can happen in a Marquette winter. We plan WDMI cases around those realities from the first scheduling order.
A Compact Bench Across Two Peninsulas
By 28 U.S.C. § 133’s allotment the Western District of Michigan holds four district judgeships, and the court’s own judicial directory, as of mid-2026, lists exactly four district judges: Chief Judge Hala Y. Jarbou, with chambers in Lansing; Judge Paul L. Maloney in Kalamazoo; and Judges Robert J. Jonker and Jane M. Beckering in Grand Rapids. Four magistrate judges — Phillip J. Green, Ray Kent, and Sally Berens in Grand Rapids, and Maarten Vermaat in Marquette — handle initial appearances, detention hearings, and referred motions, with Judge Vermaat covering the Upper Peninsula from its own courthouse.
A four-judge court means something practical: the same small set of chambers sees every significant criminal case in the district, year after year. Reputations for preparation — good and bad — are made fast and remembered long. We treat that as an asset: in a court this size, careful lawyering is visible, and we make sure ours is. What we never do is trade on predictions about individual judges; the record we build works in any courtroom in the district.
Federal Criminal Cases in the District
The Sentencing Commission’s FY2024 packet for this district counts 226 people sentenced — a modest volume with an unmistakable profile. Firearms cases led at 28.3%, more than double the national share; drug cases ran 26.5%; fraud, theft, and embezzlement reached 14.6%; and sexual-abuse offenses, at 8.4% against a 2.3% national figure, reflect the federal jurisdiction that follows this district’s geography, including offenses arising on tribal lands prosecuted federally. White-collar matters round out the docket. The procedural path is the familiar one.
Most cases begin with an investigation by a federal agency, sometimes signaled by a target letter or a grand jury subpoena. Formal charges follow, typically by indictment. After an initial appearance and arraignment, the case proceeds through pretrial litigation and discovery, and is then resolved either by a negotiated plea agreement or by trial. A conviction is followed by sentencing under the federal framework. The full sequence is laid out in our federal criminal process hub.
In a district where 95.1% of FY2024 convictions came by plea and eleven cases went to trial, our defense work concentrates where the leverage actually is: suppression and Fourth Amendment litigation in the gun cases, statutory and constitutional challenges where the law is moving, and sentencing advocacy built on a record the Sixth Circuit can work with. When trial is the right answer — and this district’s own recent history proves juries here can and do acquit — we try the case.
Applied Insight: The Whitmer-plot trials taught a lesson every WDMI defendant should hear: outcomes in this courthouse are not preordained. Of six men federally charged, two pleaded guilty, two were acquitted outright by a Grand Rapids jury, and two were convicted only on retrial. Federal juries take their work seriously here — which means the defense that prepares as if trial is real, rather than treating a plea as inevitable, negotiates from genuine strength.
Guns, the Whitmer Plot, and What WDMI Prosecutors Bring
As of mid-2026, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Michigan is led by Timothy VerHey, a career federal prosecutor whom the district court’s judges appointed United States Attorney under 28 U.S.C. § 546(d), effective November 18, 2025, to serve until a Senate-confirmed appointee is sworn in; he has since been nominated for the post but not yet confirmed. The office’s defining matter of the past decade is a matter of public record: the prosecutions arising from the conspiracy to kidnap Michigan’s governor. Per the office’s own releases, six men were charged federally in October 2020; two pleaded guilty; two were acquitted at the first trial in 2022; and after a retrial before Judge Jonker in Grand Rapids, the two remaining defendants were convicted of kidnapping conspiracy and conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction, drawing sentences of 16 years and 235 months (roughly 19½ years) in December 2022. We recount those outcomes — convictions and acquittals alike — because together they describe this court accurately: a forum where the government tries hard cases and where the defense can win them.
The volume docket is firearms. At 28.3% of FY2024 sentencings, gun cases dominate, and the law around them is moving: United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024), upheld § 922(g)(8) on its face while confirming that Second Amendment analysis turns on history and the facts of the restriction, and Rehaif v. United States, 588 U.S. 225 (2019), requires the government to prove the defendant knew of the status that barred possession. Felon-in-possession defendants in this district should expect us to test the stop, the search, the statute, and the status element — every time.
The rest of the docket rewards versatility: fraud prosecutions at half again the national share — including a multi-year international mail and wire fraud scheme indicted in December 2023, per the office’s releases — drug conspiracies along the I-94 and I-96 corridors, and the serious-offense docket that follows federal jurisdiction across the district’s tribal lands and federal property.
Appeals and Post-Conviction Matters
The district’s own marquee cases went up on appeal, and yours can too. Review lies in the Sixth Circuit, with Rule 4(b) allowing fourteen days from entry of judgment for the notice of appeal. Our practice is to resolve the appeal question with the client before sentencing concludes — if the answer is yes, the notice is ready to file the day judgment enters, whether the courtroom was in Grand Rapids or four hundred miles north in Marquette.
Post-judgment, a motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 returns to this court, where our federal post-conviction practice litigates ineffective-assistance, sentencing-error, and new-rule claims. Because no Bureau of Prisons facility sits inside the district, WDMI-sentenced clients serve their time elsewhere — Michigan’s only federal prison, FCI Milan, is across the line in the Eastern District of Michigan — so § 2241 custody petitions belong to the district of confinement while the § 2255 belongs here. On compassionate release, candor is owed: WDMI judges decided 57 motions in fiscal year 2025 — a volume second in the Sixth Circuit only to the Northern District of Ohio — and granted 2, a 3.5% rate against 14.1% nationally. After Rutherford, the motions that succeed anywhere rest on rigorously documented medical, age, or family grounds, and in this district they must be exceptional.
How the Firm Practices in This Court
We appear in the Western District of Michigan by pro hac vice admission — the case-specific admission every federal district court provides for qualified outside counsel. It is a short procedural step, and it has never been the thing that decides a federal case.
What decides federal cases is the law, and it is the same Title 18, the same Guidelines, and the same Sixth Circuit precedent whether the courtroom overlooks the Grand River or Lake Superior. For Michigan clients whose matters touch both of the state’s federal courts, it is worth knowing the difference in our posture: in the Eastern District of Michigan Elizabeth Franklin-Best holds standing bar admission, while here we proceed by pro hac vice motion — and the representation itself is identical either way.
In a four-judge district with a gun-heavy docket and a 3.5% compassionate-release grant rate, the counsel worth hiring is the one who can litigate a Rahimi-era Second Amendment question, preserve it for Cincinnati, and carry the fight into post-conviction if that is where it must go. Elizabeth Franklin-Best — admitted to the Sixth Circuit and every other federal circuit, author of Reversing Your Criminal Conviction — built her practice for exactly that arc, and we bring all of it to Western District of Michigan engagements. Across her career she has handled more than 330 federal matters, over 100 of them appeals, and has appeared in all twelve federal circuits and at the U.S. Supreme Court — the kind of federal depth that lets a Grand Rapids trial and a Cincinnati appeal be planned as one continuous fight rather than two separate ones.
Frequently Asked Questions
What area does the Western District of Michigan cover?
The western half of the Lower Peninsula and the entire Upper Peninsula. Court sits in Grand Rapids — the district’s headquarters, in the Gerald R. Ford Federal Building — plus Kalamazoo, Lansing, and Marquette, where a resident magistrate judge serves the U.P. from its own federal courthouse.
Who prosecutes federal crimes in the Western District of Michigan?
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Michigan, based in Grand Rapids — the office behind the Whitmer kidnapping-plot prosecutions. As of mid-2026 it is led by Timothy VerHey, whom the district court’s judges appointed U.S. Attorney under 28 U.S.C. § 546(d) effective November 18, 2025 to serve until a Senate-confirmed successor is sworn in; its volume work is firearms, drugs, fraud, and the serious offenses that fall to federal jurisdiction across the district’s geography.
Which appeals court covers the Western District of Michigan?
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati reviews every WDMI judgment, applying the same precedent that binds all four of its states. In a district whose biggest cases draw national attention, appellate strategy belongs in the trial plan from the start — not bolted on after the verdict.
How does a federal criminal case proceed in the Western District of Michigan?
Charges usually arrive by grand jury indictment, with the first appearance and detention hearing before a magistrate judge — in Grand Rapids for most of the district, or before the resident magistrate judge in Marquette for U.P. cases. Pretrial litigation follows, then plea or trial: in fiscal year 2024, 95.1% of convictions came by plea and eleven cases were tried. Sentencing under the Guidelines closes the district-court chapter.
Can an out-of-state lawyer represent me in the Western District of Michigan?
Yes. The court admits qualified outside counsel pro hac vice for individual cases — a routine, fast step. The substance never changes with the lawyer’s mailing address: the same federal statutes, Guidelines, and Sixth Circuit precedent govern in Marquette as in Memphis.
Does the firm handle federal cases in the Western District of Michigan?
Yes. We handle Western District of Michigan matters end to end — investigation, indictment, trial-level defense, Sixth Circuit appeal, and Section 2255 and compassionate-release litigation — appearing pro hac vice and drawing on a national federal practice.
What happened in the Whitmer kidnapping-plot prosecutions?
Per the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s public releases: six men were federally charged in October 2020 with conspiring to kidnap Michigan’s governor. Two pleaded guilty; two were acquitted at the first trial in 2022; and the remaining two were convicted at a retrial in Grand Rapids of kidnapping conspiracy and conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction, receiving sentences of 16 years and 235 months in December 2022.
Is there a federal prison in the Western District of Michigan?
No. Michigan’s only Bureau of Prisons facility, FCI Milan, sits in the Eastern District. People sentenced in WDMI serve their time outside the district, which means Section 2241 petitions about custody, credits, or sentence computation are filed in the district of confinement, while Section 2255 motions return to the WDMI sentencing court.
How hard is it to win compassionate release in the Western District of Michigan?
Statistically, very hard. WDMI decided 57 compassionate-release motions in fiscal year 2025 — within the Sixth Circuit, a volume second only to the Northern District of Ohio — and granted 2, about 3.5%, versus 14.1% nationally. The motions that succeed are built on extraordinary, exhaustively documented medical, age, or family circumstances, not on changes in sentencing law.
Talk With a Federal Criminal Defense Lawyer
This district has shown that federal cases can end in acquittal, in hard-fought sentences, or in convictions that still get challenged for years — the variable is the quality of the defense at each stage. If your matter sits anywhere in the Western District of Michigan, from a Grand Rapids gun charge to an Upper Peninsula indictment, book the paid, one-hour initial consultation and let us show you what a serious assessment looks like.