Nolan Finley

Recipe for Detroit's political corruption

Deniability is everything when you're in the business of corrupt politics.

An official on the take has to be able to deny, even to herself, that the money she's pocketing isn't really a bribe.

Details are still emerging of how the corruption worked in the case of Detroit City Council President Pro Tempore Monica Conyers, who pleaded guilty Friday to federal bribery charges.

But here's how it was explained to me:

Conyers very early in her council career learned that her vote had value far beyond making the city work.

She could make some people a lot of money depending on how she cast her vote. That became even more true once she got on the city's cash-rich pension board.

Why shouldn't she be rewarded for her service?

So she started to think about how to make politics a bit more lucrative.

At the pension board, she noticed that hardly anyone gets a loan unless they're walked in the door by a consultant. The icebreaker is often someone with close ties to a trustee or a big shot at City Hall. Sometimes, he's even a relative of a very important person.

As it happens, she had a consultant, who she was tight with. He shaped her career, and she doesn't make a move without his advice. But she can't pay him what they both think he's worth.

She hatches a plan to take care of both problems without the risk of dirtying her hands.

When someone comes courting a vote on a city contract or a pension fund loan, Conyers suggests the process would go a lot smoother if the vote seeker hired her consultant to help navigate the city's quirky politics.

The consultant takes over from there, negotiating a retainer, say $10,000. He is also assigned to take first-class trips to exotic locales to weigh the worthiness of the request. Sometimes, he even gets a fancy watch as partial payment.

He knows who's buttering his bread and is grateful. Since the councilwoman got him the work, he feels moved to pay her a finder's fee, say $5,000, or half the retainer.

They tell themselves this isn't a bribe because they're both getting compensated for services rendered.

But Conyers wanted a bigger payday. She demanded a larger cut of the pot, 60 percent instead of half. When the consultant balked, she decided to cut out the middleman.

Once she started representing herself, denying bribery became more challenging, and the risk of getting caught went through the roof. But she got hooked on the walking-around money and ignored the dangers.

Enter the feds, with their cameras and tape recorders. They think they're looking at a game of quid pro quo.

A little squeezing and a few of the players started to sing.

And suddenly, denial for Conyers is a river that may flow straight to a jail cell.

Nolan Finley is editorial page editor of The News. Reach him at nfinley@detnews.com or (313) 222-2064. Watch him at 8:30 p.m. Fridays on "Am I Right?" on Detroit Public TV, Channel 56.