Sheriff Candidate Ken Magee: Fact Checking Mr. Clean

by P.D. Lesko

Ken Magee, candidate for County Sheriff, is clean, squeaky clean. In his more than 30-year career as a front line police officer, DEA agent and Chief of Police at the University of Michigan, Magee has never been disciplined. He has never been fired from a policing job. He has earned dozens of commendations, including from the U.S. government. He has had a career as a public servant that could be mistaken for something out of the movie “Forest Gump.”

• Magee was on the DEA team that helped hunt down and capture drug lord Pablo Escobar in South America.
• July 27, 1996: where was Ken Magee? At Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park at the time of the bombing. He helped save multiple victims’ lives.
• When Barack Obama was President? Ken Magee provided security when the President spoke at U-M’s 2010 Commencement ceremony.

There’s a photo of Magee and Obama on Magee’s campaign website.

Magee was Chief of Police at the University of Michigan in Oct. 2009, when then Athletic Dir. Bill Martin was accused of physically assaulting students working security at Michigan Stadium. Magee’s Dept. handled the investigation into Martin despite the fact the students declined to press charges.

“I came under intense pressure to make the investigation disappear,” says Magee. “I was called on the carpet and pressured not to launch an investigation.”

What Magee did then was reported nation-wide: Michigan Athletic Dir. Bill Martin released a letter announcing his abrupt retirement three days after he was informed that an investigation into his alleged physical assaults of multiple students on the Stadium’s security team had been launched. Martin retired Sept. 4, 2010.

Magee also says he was pressured while Chief of Police to make complaints related to student rapes disappear. He refused. Magee stated that after his departure he “willingly gave an interview to the U.S. Dept. of Education’s Division of Civil Rights, where he talked about numerous instances of pressures to influence the outcomes of sexual assault investigations.”

In November 2010, U-M Police Chief Ken Magee went on extended sick leave. Whether he was eligible for extended sick leave was questioned. He and his employer then parted ways and Magee received a settlement approaching half a million dollars. He signed a non-disclosure agreement, but when he received the settlement, the University of Michigan released a statement and so did Magee through his lawyer, Nick Roumel.

In a letter to the media released by Magee through Roumel, Roumel wrote, “The agreement makes it clear that Chief Magee remains eligible for rehire by the University. The attachment to the agreement, referenced in paragraph 4 and prepared by the University, notes many of Chief Magee’s positive accomplishments, including numerous campus safety enhancements, improved employee satisfaction scores, and many recognitions at the regional and national levels, including a safe and successful spring, 2010 commencement exercise at Michigan Stadium with President Obama.”

Magee’s replacement was a man named Greg O’Dell, former Chief of Police at Eastern Michigan University and an Interim Chief of Police at the Ann Arbor Police Dept.

O’Dell shot and killed himself shortly after serving as the Chief of Police at U-M for just four months in 2011. Sources say one of O’Dell’s suicide notes allegedly mentioned facing some of the same pressures that Magee faced while Chief of Police at U-M. The contents of O’Dell’s suicide note(s) were never released to the public.

Fact checking Ken Magee’s academic credentials, job applications, resumes, policing records, personnel file contents and his campaign website was like playing a game of Tetris where all the pieces go together perfectly. There are no gaps, no pieces that don’t fit, no inconsistencies, no exaggerations, no fibs, and no factual errors.

When told of the results of the extensive fact checking, Magee said: “You didn’t find the ticket I got from the City of Ann Arbor when the sidewalk in front of the rental I owned wasn’t cleared of snow?”

It was 2017. Magee went to court; his tenant testified on his behalf, because the lease required the tenant to shovel the snow. Nonetheless, Ken Magee paid the $110 ticket.

His opponent Alyshia Dyer put up a Facebook post (since deleted) in which she claimed, “Ken Magee usually runs as a Republican.”

Magee refers to his 2016 run as a Republican for Sheriff as a “philosophical mistake.” He lost, capturing just shy of 10,000 votes total. He ran again in 2020 as a Democrat, and incumbent Jerry Clayton captured 75 percent of the primary vote. Since then, Magee has been publicly recognized as one of the top supporters of the Michigan Democratic Party thanks to his work on behalf of the party and his donations in support of the party.

Campaign donation records show that plenty of Washtenaw County Democratic supporters, including elected officials, openly supported former Gov. Rick Snyder when he ran against Democrat Virg Bernero. In Ann Arbor, then City Council member Stephen Kunselman (D-Ward 3) was the only Council member who donated to Bernero’s campaign. Bernero came very close to losing Democratic stronghold Washtenaw County to Snyder in the gubernatorial election.

In Ann Arbor, Republican Stephen Rapundalo ran for Mayor in 2000. After he lost, he ran for City Council as a Democrat and was subsequently supported by other Democrats on City Council, including former Mayor John Hieftje and now mayor Chris Taylor. Republican Marcia Higgins served as a Republican on City Council for six years, then ran for City Council as a Democrat and, like Rapundalo, was embraced by her Democratic colleagues, once again, including Mayors John Hieftje and Chris Taylor (as Ward 3 Council member when Higgins ran as a Dem.).

Magee describes Democratic party leaders in the County as using his one-time run as a Republican as a purity test.

His opponent Alyshia Dyer has attacked him directly and indirectly stating he doesn’t have a commitment to the kinder, gentler, “less racist,” more “social work centered” policing policies she says she will bring to the Sheriff’s Dept.

Magee counters that policing is about accountability: within the Sheriff’s Dept., and on the streets, where he wants to focus on reducing rampant gun crime, rising opioid deaths, and re-center the Sheriff’s Dept. on public safety and away from buzz words and politics.

“Fact Check My Opponents”

At a candidate event in November 2023, Sheriff candidate Derrick Jackson called on those in attendance to “fact check” his opponents. He asked his opponents at the candidate event, “What have you actually done in years past that will allow you to achieve what you say you will?”

The Ann Arbor Independent took Jackson’s challenge and over the past several months obtained job applications, Michigan State Police MCOLES records, college transcripts, resumes, police reports, and the personnel files of all three candidates for Sheriff: Derrick Jackson, Alyshia Dyer and Ken Magee.

• Ken Magee’s resume, cover letter and job application submitted for the position of Chief of Police at the University of Michigan and for his job at the DEA were obtained using the Freedom of Information Act.
• For Alyshia Dyer, the resume was one she said at a candidate event at Arrowwood she’d post to her campaign website, but never did. When asked about it, Dyer posted a resume to her campaign Facebook page. Her job application to work for the Sheriff was included in her personnel files
• Derrick Jackson’s resumes, cover letters and job applications for his employment at Eastern Michigan University, and the Sheriff’s Dept. were obtained using the Freedom of Information Act.

Derrick Jackson has since stopped suggesting voters fact check him or anyone else. Jackson has steadfastly refused to be interviewed by The A2Indy, claiming in public that articles documenting his many lies and brazen fabrications amount to “tearing down a Black man.” Jackson is now running for Sheriff as a “victim” of racism, he claims.

Alyshia Dyer, in an email, said she is also a victim: “I could go on for days about the sexism I’ve experienced on this campaign trail from people in politics but at the end of the day what really matters are the issues I’m running on.”

Ken Magee says he is not running as a victim, but as the most experienced and best qualified candidate in the race.

He says he will focus on creating a more effective and responsive Sheriff’s Dept. (which is currently rated as a 2-star service provider on Google; the Dept.’s reviews on Facebook are equally abysmal), focus on reducing and solving crimes county-wide, focus on helping victims of crime, and getting the Sheriff’s Dept. properly staffed. In 2009, when Sheriff Clayton was elected, Michigan State Police records show his Dept. employed 129 full-time deputies and fielded 6,614 crime reports, total. Only 16 percent of the 5,672 Class A crimes reported in 2009 were solved: these are the most serious felonies, rape, kidnapping, armed robbery, felonious assault, and murder.

Since March 2024, there have been a record 37 shootings in Washtenaw County. County records show in 2024 the Sheriff’s Dept., whose budget has risen more than 85 percent, now employs 81 deputies, and 12 command officers (two lieutenants, and ten sargeants). In 2009, the Sheriff’s total budget was just under $35 million (the largest single expenditure in the County’s total budget). In 2025, the Sheriff’s Dept. is projected to cost taxpayers $65,843,422, again the singlest largest expenditure in the County’s total projected 2025 $148,704,095 general fund budget.

The A2Indy’s factcheck project started in July 2023: All three candidates were asked to voluntarily turn over their personnel files.

• Derrick Jackson never responded to the request;
• Alyshia Dyer, who is running on a platform that stresses transparency, said she would, but never did. (The newspaper used FOIA to obtain the files of both Dyer and Jackson.)
• Ken Magee, who is also running on a platform that stresses transparency, turned over his file almost immediately.

My Professional Life is an Open Book

Ken Magee says his professional life is an “open book” and that he has “nothing to hide.” One of his priorities is to make the Sheriff’s Dept. more transparent, including loosening restrictions on Freedom of Information Act requests.

For example, in a recent op-ed, he said he’s open to calling in federal prosecutors to put a stop to a County Prosecutor who gives sweetheart sentencing deals to repeat domestic abusers, and felons who possess guns, and who receive light sentences, get out of the County Jail, then go on to murder people.

Unlike his two opponents, he’s doesn’t believe that a Sheriff’s Dept. should partner with unsupervised felons to respond to crimes in any part of the County. Ken Magee wants to use public money and provide robust support to victims, not fund the felons who victimized innocent people and who want millions in public money to be unqualified and untrained “mentors” to children and other felons.

“Restorative Justice is a component of my platform and a vital part of the program is the support afforded to the victims in our community,” wrote Magee in an op-ed recently published in The Ann Arbor Independent. “Our duly elected County Commissioners voted to award grant funding for (under the pressure of my opponent, Derrick Jackson) a non-profit called ‘Supreme Felons, Inc.’ controlled by Derrick Jackson and run by a front group of convicted criminals. In July 2022, these felons were gifted your hard-earned tax dollars to ‘mediate’ and ‘de-escalate’ gun crime in your community. How has putting Derrick Jackson and his felons in charge of crime prevention for the past two years worked out? Michigan State Police data show that in our county murder, felony assault and gun crimes have risen sharply. Meanwhile, throughout Michigan and the U.S., FBI crime statistics show violent crime is down significantly.”

Supreme Felons, Inc. leaders’ text messages shared with the newspaper show the group was formed and is currently controlled by Derrick Jackson and his employee, seven-time felon Marvin Gundy. Jackson and Gundy, in a cell phone message, appointed Alan K. Fuqua, a registered sex offender and child rapist “President” of Supreme Felons, Inc. and murderer on parole, Billy Cole, Vice President, in 2021.

Marvin Gundy is presently under investigation by the Michigan AG for witness intimidation and witness tampering related to the shooting of a teen.

In 2023, Michigan launched a state-wide program to support returning citizens, the MDOC Walk a Mile Mentoring Program. The mentoring relationship is virtual and voluntary. All mentors are trained. Social workers, other volunteers and professionals do that work, and are accountable to MDOC and other state officials. The other main difference between the Sheriff’s program and that of the MDOC is that the MDOC program has quantifiable goals, and researchers from Michigan State University analyze the program results.

Magee has a plan to combat the huge spike in gun violence. Since March 2024, there have been 37 shootings in the County, an almost 40 percent increase over the same time frame in 2023.

Magee has a plan to beef up programs to help and care for victims, and says he is the only candidate who is talking about opioid epidemic in the County, a killer predominantly within the County’s Black community. Ask him about the County jail, and he’ll talk to you about his plan to use a part of the jail for drug, alcohol and mental health treatment.

Ken Magee Has “Zero Chance to Win”

On Facebook, Alyshia Dyer recently posted an answer in response to a comment in which an individual said she would not be qualified for a job as a Chief of Police, much less a Sheriff. Dyer responded that she was most certainly qualified to apply and could be hired into a Chief of Police job.

In 2023, Ann Arbor hired a new Chief of Police. The job announcement is clear about the professional experience necessary and the qualifications expected of applicants.

How do the candidates stack up, according to their professional records?

All three candidates for Sheriff have earned MCOLES certification by completing an eight-week Police Academy course.

Ken Magee’s federal, U-M and MCOLES policing records show he meets or exceeds all of the required qualifications and experience required of applicants for the Ann Arbor Chief job.

The personnel records, college records and State MCOLES records of Derrick Jackson and Alyshia Dyer show they do not meet the qualifications to apply for the job of Chief of Police or serve as the Chief in any police department the size of Ann Arbor’s (125 officers).

• Derrick Jackson has 15 years of experience as a Dir. of Community Engagement, this includes limited budgeting and supervisory experience. He supervises three employees.
• He does not hold the required undergraduate degree: he earned a B.A. in social work.
• He has no command experience, and he has never graduated from any command leadership program.

• In a recent mailer, Alyshia Dyer told voters she has “nearly a decade of experience in road and marine patrol.” (Her personnel records show this is misleading and false.)
• Alyshia Dyer has an undergraduate degree in Criminal Justice and two Master’s degrees, but she does not have the required ten years of experience.
• She does not have any command experience, and has never graduated from any command leadership program. By her own admission at a League of Women Voters candidate event, Dyer has no budgeting or supervisory experience in policing.

When questioned about her assertion she has almost ten years of experience, in an email Dyer admitted she has “rounded up” her experience. However, she has done more than just “rounded up” to try to convince voters to believe she is qualified to be the next Sheriff. Her Michigan State Police MCOLES records show she worked six years and four months for the County Sheriff as a full-time patrol officer. In claiming “almost ten years of experience,” she “rounded up” her experience in the WCSO by three years and eight months.

In a late-June two-page mailer, Dyer highlights her “marine patrol experience” and equates it with her full-time car patrol experience.

Dyer’s personnel file shows that her marine patrol experience was part-time. More to the point, while on marine patrol, the contract she signed says, she did not have the “powers of a peace officer in this State.”

At the same time Dyer criticizes Derrick Jackson for having no policing experience (He has none.), she tells voters her marine patrol experience as a “Special Deputy Sheriff” was policing experience the same as full-time patrol experience. It was not, according to the contracts she signed. For example, the 2020 contract she signed (below) stipulated she was required to comply with the same State concealed weapons laws as every other Michigan resident. In other words, she would have to apply for a permit to carry a concealed weapon and be approved.

When asked about the discrepancy between the amount of time she claims she worked for the Sheriff’s Dept., and what her Michigan State Police (MCOLES) records show, Dyer said in an email, “Any MCOLES paperwork…is incorrect information and wouldn’t be the first time the sheriff’s office made a mistake with paperwork.”

On the first page of an individual’s MCOLES record, there are directions to correct one’s record by asking one’s employer to provide accurate information to the State. Dyer has never asked for her record to be corrected.

Ken Magee chuckles when told Dyer is convinced that he, the most experienced candidate, has “zero chance to win.” She has said the same thing in angry texts to Magee he shared with the newspaper. When he published an op-ed, she threatened him with legal action, but did not follow through.

“She’s deluded if she thinks she could be a Police Chief,” he says. “You could call any of the several hundred law enforcement leaders of the agencies in Michigan and all of them would tell you Alyshia Dyer is unqualified to lead any policing agency.”

Alyshia Dyer Criticized By “Many in the Current Establishment”

It’s not only Magee or “many in the current establishment” who criticize Dyer. While Alyshia Dyer has posted to social media that she was one of the best patrol deputies Sheriff Clayton ever employed, her former patrol partners disagree.

Ray Yee, a former patrol officer who worked with Dyer, referred to her as a “shit sandwich.”

Dyer, herself, admits she once finished a long shift, left her patrol car running with the keys in the ignition, computer and weapons in the car, got into her personal car and went home. It was shortly after this her MCOLES records show she left her job. Her personnel file shows she resigned as of July 20, 2015 and then in Nov. 2015 asked for a 90-day leave of absence. It was granted and she returned to the Sheriff’s Dept. in Jan. 2016.

In July of 2015 when she left the Sheriff’s Dept., a Sheriff’s Dept. police record shows she got so intoxicated at a going away party with colleagues, she passed out in the bathroom of a local restaurant. She was incapacitated, and Dyer required ambulance transport to the hospital, according to the police report.

In a June 2024 post to her campaign Facebook page, Dyer admitted to being drunk at her going away party, but did not tell the whole truth about the incident. In the same public Facebook post, she said she had never done cocaine or been in rehab.

Fact Checking the “Great Pretender”

Like Alyshia Dyer, his own records show Derrick Jackson is not qualified to apply for, and would not be hired, as a Chief of Police. In addition, his dishonesty and unethical conduct in impersonating a social worker while representing the Sheriff’s Dept. and Washtenaw County, and lying about his professional achievements should result in an investigation into his conduct, says Magee.

Instead, Jackson has been given the next 50 days off (paid) to campaign.

The Ann Arbor Independent has published multiple articles in which Derrick Jackson has been shown to be a serial liar and a fabulist. Like former GOP Congressman George Santos, who was expelled from Congress when his easily detected lies and campaign finance violations were uncovered by the media, Derrick Jackson’s lies and campaign finance violations have been uncovered and made public.

Derrick Jackson’s response to being caught in lie after lie and having been outed for fabricating his credentials, awards and achievements, has been to complain that a Black man is being torn down–it’s racist to fact check his claims and reveal a man running for Sheriff is a serial liar, says Jackson.

State of Michigan licensing records revealed that Derrick Jackson has impersonated a licensed social worker for over a decade. A licensed social worker filed a complaint against him and State officials are investigating. The same social worker filed a complaint with the County Prosecutor who is not investigating, according to public records.

Eli Savit has endorsed Derrick Jackson.

All of Jackson’s resumes contain fabrications and easily uncovered lies.

For example, when he applied to teach social work at Eastern Michigan University, he put among his long list of awards a Washtenaw County ACLU award. Only he never won it; former State Senator Alma Wheeler Smith did.

EMU found no evidence that Derrick Jackson was “EMU Bachelor’s of Social Work Alumni of the Year recipient,” as he claims on his EMU application to teach. He was on the Dean’s List for two years, and did win the Martin Luther King Award. But records provided by the University didn’t show he was a “Ten Time Mid-American Conference Champion” during his college career as a track runner.

Jackson was selected as an All-MAC Academic Athlete once, in 1998, according to EMU academics records provided to the newspaper.

In his EMU resume, he also claimed to be a “certified school social worker.” According to State of Michigan licensure records for social workers, Derrick Jackson has never had any state licensure or certification in social work, or certification as a “school social worker.” The University of Michigan Registrar confirmed that Derrick Jackson does have the MSW degree, but his degree has no “Concentration in Interpersonal Practice & Community Organizing.” This is a lie.

He didn’t teach at EMU from 2002-2019, as the resume on his campaign website claims. EMU employment records show he taught there 2002-2013, left, and then taught from 2016-2019. His pay records show he left one week into the 2019 Fall semester.

His teaching evaluations were generally good, but a Sheriff’s Dept. investigation alleged he had a sexual relationship with a student.

EMU officials would not comment when asked about Jackson and his student. Jackson’s EMU personnel file shows no evidence that he was ever disciplined, but it does show he left his job as an adjunct abruptly.

The investigating Sheriff’s Deputy, Ray Yee, says an EMU social work student went missing for three days. A wellness check call was initiated by the student’s roommate. Yee and his partner responded. Jackson’s student returned home days later and explained to investigating officers that she had been with her social work “professor” Derrick Jackson, and that they were having a sexual relationship.

In late-June, the newspaper submitted a Freedom of Information Request for Sheriff’s records related to the wellness check involving Jackson and his student. At a July event organized by the Washtenaw County Democrats Black Caucus event, Jackson told those present that he would be accused of being a “predator.”

On July 2, Jackson posted his Black Caucus comments on YouTube with the title: “How to Tear Down a Black Community Leader.” In his comments, like George Santos and Donald Trump, Jackson claims all of the reporting documenting his lies and fabrications are “made up.”

In the YouTube video, Jackson savages his opponent Alyshia Dyer, and compares calls for him to provide proof of any licensure as a social worker with calls for President Obama to produce his birth certificate.

“The 2020 NAMI Michigan Honors Nominee” claim from Jackson’s campaign website resume above is a fabrication. NAMI Michigan officials checked their records. In 2020, NAMI Michigan nominated no one and held no award ceremony because of the pandemic.

At the 2020 Congressional Briefing, Derrick Jackson lied before members of Congress when he said he was a social worker. In 2005, Michigan required all social workers to obtain a state license. In 2020, Derrick Jackson had no license, he had never done the required 4,000 hours of supervised work and had not passed the required test for licensure. Jackson impersonated a licensed social worker before Congress.

The 2012 “Outstanding Recruit, Schoolcraft College Regional police Academy,” from his resume is a fabrication. MCOLES records show he was selected “Recruit of the Week,” a rotating honor. Similarly, he never received a 2012 Outstanding Performance Award, MCOLES.” That award doesn’t exist.

Derrick Jackson’s MCOLES records show he did, however, receive recognition as scoring 191 out of 200 on his spelling quizzes, came in #1 in firearms training and he graduated number 3 in a class of 31.

Both Alyshia Dyer and Derrick Jackson claim to be highly decorated. Jackson’s personnel file lists three awards: Longevity 5 Year, Longevity 10 Year and in 2020 a Community Engagement Award. Dyer’s personnel file lists one letter of commendation and one award.

In an email, Alyshia Dyer said about the fact checking of her background, employment and campaign claims, “I’m very confused about how this has been made into something else, but I guess that’s politics these days.”

Magee said, “Without this fact checking, people would just lie and get away with it. Thank you.”