30-year veteran of Detroit Police Department gets prison for taking bribes

DETROIT – A former officer with the Detroit Police Department will spend time in prison for taking $3,200 in cash bribes.

Alonzo Jones, 55, of Detroit, was sentenced to 15 months in prison and two years of supervised release based on his plea of guilty to accepting bribes, United States Attorney Dawn N. Ison announced Tuesday.

Jones, an officer with the department for more than 30 years, corruptly accepted cash bribes on five separate occasions with the intent to be influenced and rewarded in connection with his duties overseeing and running the Detroit Police Vehicle Auction.

The last bribe he took was right before he retired from DPD in May 2021, prosecutors said.

“Every new police officer takes an oath to uphold our laws and act with integrity,” Ison said in a statement. “This officer broke that oath, and his crimes are an affront to the citizens of Detroit and the honest officers of the Detroit Police Department who put their lives on the line to protect those citizens. This sentence shows our office’s commitment to aggressively pursuing police officers who use their trusted positions of authority to enrich themselves.”

Jones was charged as part of an investigation known as “Operation Northern Hook,” an investigation of corruption within the government and the DPD relating to the towing industry and other matters.

Michael Stout, 60, of St. Clair Shores, who left the Hamtramck Police Department in 2020, was charged with bribery in March.

In December 2021, Michael Pacteles, 44, of Southgate, a former Detroit police officer who was working as an officer in Hamtramck, was charged with bribery.

In October 2021, Detroit’s Lt. John F. Kennedy, 56, of Rochester Hills, and officer Daniel S. Vickers, 54, of Livonia, were each charged with three counts of bribery and one count of conspiracy to commit bribery.

In September 2021, Detroit City Council member Andre Spivey pleaded guilty to accepting bribes related to oversight of towing policy; he later resigned.

The investigation of the case was conducted by the FBI. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Frances Lee Carlson.