Detroit/Wayne County Port Authority
Wayne County Commissioner Jonathan Kinloch.
Wayne County Commissioner Jonathan Kinloch, a longtime political activist and Detroit Democrat, never served a 30-day jail sentence after getting busted for his third drunk driving in a little over three years in 2003, Metro Times has learned.
Records show that a judge and the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office mishandled Kinloch’s sentencing, allowing him to avoid jail even though state law required him to spend at least 30 days behind bars. From the beginning, the case was riddled with errors, eyebrow-raising decisions, and false promises.
While the arrest was 20 years ago, the case raises serious questions about whether political connections may have shielded Kinloch from consequences that ordinary defendants face.
Kinloch is the brother of Detroit mayoral candidate Solomon Kinloch, the senior pastor of Detroit-based megachurch Triumph Church. Solomon Kinloch is facing Detroit City Council Mary Sheffield in the November general election after coming in second place in the Aug. 5 primary. Residency questions have plagued his campaign after moving from Oakland County to Detroit in March 2024. He said he was living with his brother in an upscale condo complex downtown.
The strange case involving Jonathan Kinloch began on Aug. 14, 2003, when Detroit police pulled him over and discovered he was drunk and driving with a suspended license. For reasons that still remain unclear, the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office didn’t charge Kinloch until February 2005, a year-and-a-half after he was pulled over. He was eventually charged with a felony count of third-offense drunk driving and a misdemeanor count of driving with a suspended license and faced up to five years in prison.
In a May 26, 2005 letter to the prosecutor, Kinloch requested “a lesser charge,” saying he was “embarrassed and sorry for my horrible choices” and had received out-patient treatment for substance abuse.
“If the spirit and intent of our drinking laws are to both punish, rehabilitate and stop individuals from drinking and operating a motor vehicle, then it has worked for me,” he wrote.
At the time, Kinloch was serving on the Detroit Board of Zoning Appeals and was running for a seat on the Detroit school board, which he would win in November 2005.
In exchange for him pleading guilty to a second-offense misdemeanor charge, the prosecutor’s office dropped the third-offense charge and the misdemeanor for driving with a suspended license.
Still, state law requires a minimum 30-day sentence for someone convicted of driving drunk for a third time, even if the charge is reduced.
“If you plead guilty, or if you are found guilty, you will go to jail for at least 30 days,” William Maze, who describes himself as the state’s “leading drunk driving defense attorney,” wrote on his website. “Recently, even the Wayne County Jail has been holding people for the full term. Worse still, many courts impose longer terms. Sixty days for a garden variety OWI 3rd is not unusual, and some judges impose a six month sentence.”
In September 2005, Wayne County Circuit Judge Vonda R. Evans sentenced Kinloch to 30 days in jail and six months of non-reporting probation. During the hearing, Kinloch said he no longer drinks and pledged “there will be no problems with me, at all,” according to transcripts of the sentencing hearing.
Evans responded, “I believe that.”
Instead of ordering him to jail at the sentencing hearing, which is the standard practice, Evans agreed to Kinloch’s request to serve his jail time after his probation was over in September 2005. Then, the judge said, he could serve his jail time “every other weekend.”
“In light of the fact that you’re taking a new job, this court believes that there’s a necessity that we need to have him there,” Evans said. “And that’s with the city. And so, therefore, the court is going to put that at the end.”
“You’re going to do this 30 days,” the judge told Kinloch.
She added, “You have to do that. That is statutorily required.”
But that’s not what happened. At the urging of the probation department in January 2006, Evans dropped the jail requirement, allowing Kinloch to walk free.
Then in March 2007, after a Detroit Free Press reporter inquired about the lack of jail time, Wayne Country Prosecutor Kym Worthy insisted her office was never notified of the hearing in which Kinloch’s jail sentence was waived. A day before the article was published, Assistant Prosecutor Paul Bernier filed a motion urging the judge to enforce the sentencing agreement or withdraw the plea deal.
“A Court that accepts a plea agreement must honor said plea agreement entered into by the Defendant and the Prosecution or allow the party to withdraw the plea,” Assistant Prosecutor Jamie Wittenberg wrote to the court.
In a follow-up filing in August 2007, the prosecutor’s office said it “was unable to object to the order of termination” and therefore has a right to intervene.
In January 2008, Evans acknowledged the problem with waiving Kinloch’s sentence and agreed with prosecutors that they could require Kinloch to serve his jail time or withdraw the plea agreement.
But despite the prosecutors’ harsh language and insistence on forcing Kinloch to serve his sentence, they never followed through, allowing him to dodge jail time after the media stopped asking questions, Metro Times has discovered.
Suspecting “fraud may have been committed in court,” community activist Robert Davis sought police and court records under the Freedom of Information Act in late July. After getting no response from prosecutors, Detroit police, or the Wayne County Sheriff’s Office within the required 15 business days, Davis filed a lawsuit this week in hopes of forcing the records to be disclosed, but that may not happen.
“Something nefarious is going on here,” Davis tells Metro Times. “The judge entered an order granting the prosecutor’s motion. Then the prosecutor’s office did nothing.”
He adds, “Somebody committed fraud on the court. It’s quite obvious.”
Davis also pointed out that Kinloch’s first name is misspelled in court filings — “Jonathon” — which he says makes it conveniently difficult to find his case online or in court records.
Kinloch, 56, tells Metro Times he pulled no political strings but was relieved he didn’t have to serve his jail sentence.
“It was a scary time, and it was 20 years ago, and I did everything the court required of me,” Kinloch says. “The probation department said I had fulfilled my obligations and recommended that [jail time] be deleted from my sentence.”
Asked about the prosecutors’ role in the case, Kinloch says his lawyer told him that Worthy’s office could not intervene after the judge waived the jail time.
“I don’t know,” he says. “From what I was told, there was nothing she could do.”
But there was, and Worthy’s office didn’t act.
It’s unclear why no action was taken because Worthy’s office declined to comment, citing the FOIA litigation with Davis. But Metro Times’ questions have nothing to do with the search for public records.
On Friday, Wayne County Assistant Prosecutor Gregory C. Blackburn denied Davis’s request for records, saying, “We were unable to locate any documents related to your request.”
City spokesman John Roach says Detroit’s law and police departments plan to disclose the records if they still exist, but finding them may not be easy.
“DPD is in the process of researching this to see what if any records related to this incident still exist, given it took place more than two decades ago,” Roach tells Metro Times. “Once they have the answer, they share with the Law Department whatever they find — or don’t find — for a response. The city processes about 8,000 FOIA requests a year, the majority of them related to DPD.”
After Davis’s lawsuit was filed, the sheriff’s office responded that it had no records showing that Kinloch spent time in jail.
According to the judge, Kinloch spent just three days in jail.
Kinloch was appointed to the Wayne County Board of Commissioners in January 2021 to replace the late Jewel Ware. He was elected to a four-year term last year.
Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan appointed Kinloch to the Detroit Board of Water Commissioners in April 2018, a position he still holds. Kinloch is also the chairman of the Democratic Party’s 13th Congressional District, chairman of the Detroit/Wayne County Port Authority, a member of the Wayne County Housing Commission, and a vice chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party.
He previously served as a liaison to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and held seats on the Detroit Library Commission, Wayne County Planning and Development, and Wayne County Board of Canvassers.
