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Eaton County sheriff reports December crime highlights, jail capacity and inmate-housing revenue
Summary
Sheriff Tom Reich reported December 2024 incident highlights including a home invasion, multiple crashes, a fatal pedestrian crash and a missing-person investigation; county jail average population, capacity and inmate-housing revenue were also presented to the Public Safety Committee.
Sheriff Tom Reich told the Eaton County Public Safety Committee on Jan. 4 that deputies responded to a range of incidents in December 2024, and he gave updated figures on county jail capacity and revenue from housing inmates.
Reich said deputies responded to a forced-entry home invasion on Dec. 3 at an apartment on Park West Drive; two masked suspects fled after the victim held a bedroom door closed and partial boot prints were recovered. He also summarized a series of multi-vehicle crashes on Dec. 5, a tractor-trailer jackknife on I-96, a December 8 case involving the transportation of two juvenile females who had run away from an Ohio group home, and a fatal pedestrian crash on Dec. 17 in front of Copart. Reich said deputies investigated a Dec. 12 disappearance of Gregory Pennington, 42, of Nashville, Michigan, and said foul play may be involved; Pennington was last seen Nov. 14, 2024.
The sheriff told commissioners the county’s jail has a capacity of 374 and an average daily population of 188 for the year shown in the packet. Reich said the jail generated roughly $927,000 in fiscal-year revenue from housing inmates for other entities, above the $675,000 the department had budgeted. He also described how the county’s housing programs — identified in the packet as MDOC, IDRP and RAP program placements — bring revenue but cannot be relied on as guaranteed funding.
Reich gave incident details at several county locations, including a Dec. 22 arrest after a report of a suspect allegedly stalking an Amazon warehouse employee in Delta Township; deputies located the suspect in a vehicle, he fled, collided with patrol cars and was taken into custody after a short foot chase. Reich said investigators recovered $50,000 in rented equipment after executing a search warrant following GPS tracking of the item to an address in Detroit.
Commissioner Connie Holmes asked whether recovered equipment was checked for other stolen items; Reich said detectives would identify additional stolen property if present. Commissioner Peake asked for the missing person’s name; Reich gave it as Gregory Pennington. Peake also asked whether calls on hold after 6 p.m. were a regular issue; Reich and dispatch later explained that state police staffing patterns often change after shifts end and that higher call volumes can create holds on lower-priority calls.
The sheriff closed by noting the month’s incidents were highlights only and that deputies handle many other calls not summarized in the report.
