The Association That Polices Itself: A Documented Accountability Record of PAAM’s Leadership

Becker’s Kent County office is documented, together with PAAM, in the abuse of Michigan’s speedy-trial protections. That alone would earn him a BGS entry. What makes the listing more pointed is the reported culture inside his office: after a Kent County assistant prosecutor was arrested for drunk driving, Becker continued to allow alcohol at office functions. Clutch Justice reported on this in August 2025. The rationale, if one was offered, was that the events were off the clock.

The man who runs the association that governs professional norms for Michigan’s prosecutors cannot connect the dots between a subordinate DUI arrest and his office’s alcohol culture. That is not a personal failing. That is a leadership standard, and it belongs in the record.

McDonald publicly championed juvenile lifer reform, made it a centerpiece of her public positioning, and then reversed course in specific cases when the political calculation changed. Inconsistent application of resentencing positions across defendants is documented. So is the use of taxpayer funds to retain public relations firms, a practice that benefits her public profile at public expense.

McDonald ran for Michigan Attorney General. Her prosecutorial record, including the documented selective prosecution pattern, was on the table during that campaign. She is now PAAM’s president-elect and will govern the association’s advocacy positions on sentencing, disclosure, and reform legislation.

Steinhoff filed a writ of superintending control to remove 11th Circuit Judge Brian Rahilly, characterizing private text messages as adversarial toward prosecutors. He filed this writ while simultaneously campaigning for election to the same 11th Circuit bench he was seeking to influence through the writ. The open question raised in the documented record is whether the resources of the Alger County Prosecutor’s office were used to generate the press releases that accompanied that campaign.

Using the authority of an elected prosecutor’s office as an instrument in a judicial election campaign is a structural problem regardless of the underlying merits of the writ. The conflict is in the simultaneity.

Shawn Martin, the former Baroda-Lake Township police chief, was charged with six felony counts including embezzlement by a public agent of $50,000 or more, an offense that carries up to 15 years in prison. He ultimately pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor: embezzlement of $200 to $1,000. He paid $170,346.10 in restitution and received no jail time. His fine and costs totaled $125.

The man embezzled over $170,000 from his department and left the courthouse with a misdemeanor and a check. Byrd’s office press release quoted her saying “no one is above the law.” That sentence requires some examination in light of the outcome it accompanied. The documented gap between the original felony exposure and the misdemeanor resolution, for a sitting police chief who stole six figures from public funds, is the accountability concern. It is sourced to the charging record and the plea.

The accountability concern here is structural, not personal. Eric Matwiejczyk, the Ottawa County Prosecutor’s husband, is in the Clutch Justice BGS database under Ingham County. He served as an Ingham County Assistant Prosecutor and was fired in August 2008 after his role in the wrongful murder conviction of Claude McCollum came to light. McCollum served 21 months before his release. The Michigan Attorney General’s investigation found that the exculpatory surveillance video and state police report that placed McCollum in a different building during the murder window were not disclosed to his defense attorneys before trial.

Sarah Matwiejczyk is Ottawa County’s elected prosecutor. Eric Matwiejczyk now practices criminal defense. The relational conflict between an active elected prosecutor and a former prosecutor fired for documented Brady suppression in a wrongful conviction is in the record. It is not an accusation against her. It is a documented structural fact about the household that prosecutorial credibility claims in Ottawa County originate from.

Documented selective prosecution in charging decisions and favoritism toward office employees are the basis for Savit’s BGS entry per Clutch Justice reporting. Savit has built a public profile as a reform-minded prosecutor. The documented record includes conduct that does not align with that positioning.

In April 2025, Swanson declined to issue charges against Grand Traverse County Commissioner Rob Hentschel following a criminal sexual conduct investigation conducted by the Michigan State Police. She was assigned to the case by the Michigan Attorney General’s office specifically because of conflict, meaning no local prosecutor could handle it without raising impartiality concerns. The complainant, a 38-year-old woman, alleged Hentschel sexually assaulted her at a party. She went to Munson Medical Center for a sexual assault examination. More than 1,700 people signed a petition calling for Hentschel’s resignation.

The declination came in a brief statement citing insufficient evidence to prove a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Charging declinations are legal decisions and not misconduct on their face. What warrants scrutiny here is the full context: a complainant who submitted to a hospital examination, an MSP investigation, a sitting county official with a prior PPO application from his ex-wife detailing physical, mental, and sexual harassment, and a vehicle tampering report his ex-wife attributed to him. The brief statement from Swanson offered no detail on what the evidence gap was.

This entry does not allege misconduct. It documents a charging decision, in a case assigned to Swanson precisely because of its sensitivity, that produced a two-sentence declination for a sitting official with a documented prior pattern of allegations. The pattern warrants scrutiny. It is in the record.

Fitz himself carries no documented personal finding in the public record reviewed for this article. He is included because of the institutional context of his office. His predecessor as Branch County Prosecutor, Ralph Wendell Kimble II, was suspended for 180 days by consent order from the Attorney Discipline Board, Case No. 18-049-GA, effective January 8, 2019. The ADB found Kimble had engaged in conduct violating MCL 750.520e, fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct, arising from his treatment of employees of the Prosecutor’s Office, Circuit Court, and Friend of the Court. A condition of the suspension was his resignation as Branch County Prosecutor. His costs were $1,656.12.

Fitz inherited that office. He now sits on the board of the statewide association that advocates for prosecutorial professional standards. The institutional history of the office he leads is part of the accountability picture for any prosecutor who governs it.

The Kalamazoo County Prosecutor’s Office under Getting has a documented pattern of lighter treatment for offenses committed by former public officials. The specifics are in the record. Michael Carroll, former Portage Assistant City Manager and Chief Legal Officer, was arrested for operating while intoxicated at 0.17 BAC, more than double the legal limit. The enhanced penalty threshold triggers at 0.17. Carroll resolved his case with a $500 fine, no jail, and no probation, a downward departure from the enhanced penalties the offense required. MCR 9.120(A) and MRPC 8.3 required the prosecutor, defense counsel, and the judge to report Carroll’s criminal conviction to the Attorney Grievance Commission. No such report appears to exist.

Then there is Michael Dyer, former Comstock Township Deputy Fire Chief, who pleaded no contest to operating while intoxicated at 0.155 BAC and causing serious injury after striking 11-year-old La’Shae Parker on June 22, 2025. Getting’s office jointly recommended probation with defense counsel. On November 10, 2025, Dyer received 18 months’ probation and no jail time. La’Shae Parker was struck by a drunk driver operating at nearly double the legal limit. She was 11 years old. Her attacker went home.

A pattern of treating public officials as a protected class in charging and sentencing recommendations is documented. The office entry is in the BGS List. The line prosecutors responsible for the Carroll and Dyer matters have not yet been individually identified by name.

In People v. Abcumby-Blair, the Michigan Court of Appeals held that the Muskegon County Prosecutor’s Office had a duty to disclose Giglio impeachment evidence and failed to do so. The undisclosed material concerned Detective Charles Janczarek, who had been judicially found untruthful in a prior case. The untruthfulness findings included a false statement in a warrant affidavit and testimony about a warrant the court found never existed. The Court of Appeals held the prosecution had a duty to disclose this history and failed. It found no reversible Brady violation on materiality grounds specific to that case, but the Giglio disclosure failure is adjudicated.

This is not an allegation. The Court of Appeals said so. Hilson’s office had impeachment information about a detective it was relying on, did not disclose it, and was found by an appellate court to have failed its disclosure duty. That is in the record. Hilson is an Active Past President of the organization that governs prosecutorial professional standards statewide.

In 2017, the Genesee County Prosecutor’s office declined an MSP warrant request involving a woman who had fled a rural property, citing no complainant and no victim. The man named in that report was Duane Reynolds. Beginning in March 2026, at least four sets of human remains were recovered from two properties Reynolds had previously owned. Reynolds died in 2024.

A separate 2005 charging declination in a child’s death, handled by the same office, was later taken up by the Michigan Attorney General and produced convictions.

Clutch Justice has stated plainly in its prior coverage that a charging declination is not, by itself, evidence of misconduct. Prosecutorial discretion is real and the evidentiary standard is demanding. What is documented is that Leyton’s office made two declination decisions in Genesee County, both subsequently reconsidered or overtaken by events, in matters involving serious harm. He sits on the board of the organization that advocates for prosecutorial credibility and professional standards. That is the record.

Nessel’s personal BGS entry is sourced to contested matters: an alleged violation of the prosecutorial isolation wall in a matter related to Traci Kornak; selective enforcement of election law, specifically the documented failure to charge Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson following a campaign-finance finding against her; and an alleged malicious prosecution of 2020 false-electors defendants who subsequently moved to sue Nessel personally. An additional finding concerns the refusal to investigate the destruction of prosecution files. Her office also declined to charge MSP Lt. Col. Aimee Brimacombe following a misconduct referral. All personal findings are alleged. No formal discipline has been ordered.

The office-level entry is documented and not alleged. Assistant AGs Michael Frezza, B. Eric Restuccia, and Tyler Kitzmiller are in the BGS database for a documented failure: they had actual knowledge that a person was a stalking victim, chose to pursue the victim rather than the documented stalker, and declined to forward the concerns to law enforcement. This happened inside the Michigan Attorney General’s office, under Nessel’s executive authority.

Nessel is credited with a genuine action in the guardianship reform space: after WXYZ obtained video of Oakland County Probate Judge Daniel O’Brien advising professional guardians how to use court orders as cover for liquidating wards’ assets against family wishes, Nessel characterized the conduct as appearing to give guardians permission to do something they knew they should not be doing. The reform legislation her task force backed did not become law. O’Brien lobbied against it. It died.