A St. Clair County judge has upheld a personal protection order for Port Huron City Manager James Freed against a local garden organizer accused of threatening his wife and daughters, closing out months of legal wrangling rooted in a dispute over a shuttered community garden. Judge Jennifer Smith Deegan's September 30 ruling keeps the order in place against Julian Ruck, who has already pleaded guilty to violating it twice.
Freed filed for the protective order in June 2026, alleging that Ruck sent messages threatening his family, according to the Belleville News-Democrat. Per the outlet's reporting, Ruck told Freed he was going to have to move back specifically to ruin your life and said he would make sure Freed's wife and kids never forgot it.
St. Clair County Circuit Court Judge Daniel Damman originally signed off on the protective order, but he later recused himself from the case, a move that pushed back a hearing that had been scheduled for September 3, per the same outlet's account. Judge Deegan issued the final ruling upholding the order at the end of September.
A Garden Dispute Turns Into Criminal Charges
The fight traces back to Polly's Place, a community garden Ruck set up in Port Huron in 2024. Ruck has alleged the city cut off water access to the garden, and he shut it down afterward; his lease on the property was ultimately terminated in September 2025.
Ruck sent messages to Freed referencing his family on June 3, 2026, according to the news-democrat's reporting, and continued messaging Freed even after the protective order had already been filed. He later pleaded guilty to violating the order twice and received a suspended 10-day jail sentence, meaning he avoids jail time only if he continues to comply with the order going forward. Under Michigan law, violating a personal protection order is treated as criminal contempt of court, punishable by up to 93 days in jail and a $500 fine per violation.
A City Hall Already Under Strain
The protective order saga unfolded alongside separate friction between Freed and Mayor Anita Ashford. Ashford had accused Freed of hacking into her official email account, but an independent, city-commissioned investigation cleared him of those allegations this past July, with the Port Huron City Council voting 7-0 to exonerate him, according to WGRT. The same month, Freed formally appealed to the city council to stop validating unproven claims against him, citing mounting personal safety concerns after the threats involving his daughters.
The email dispute is itself one symptom of a longer-running governance fight in Port Huron. In June 2025, Ashford called for a revision of the city charter. Michigan law allows charter rewrites to be initiated either through voter petition or a two-thirds vote of the council.
By November 2024, Freed had served as Port Huron city manager for 10 years and 5 months, and his willingness to wade into high-profile disputes is not new. In February 2022, he testified before the Michigan House Oversight Committee about workplace COVID-19 safety citations issued against the city, a case that was later dismissed after state officials destroyed key documents, according to Michigan House Republicans. Freed also became a nationally cited figure in internet free-speech law after a resident he blocked on Facebook sued him, a case that reached the U.S. Supreme Court and produced the 2024 ruling in Lindke v. Freed, which set nationwide standards for when officials act in an official capacity online, per the MTSU First Amendment Encyclopedia.
Ruck, for his part, arrives at this dispute with a colorful public profile of his own. He attempted a 16-day concert in 2016 and broke the world’s longest ukulele performance record.
