Detective Momodu Bondeva Kenton Gondo, 34, of Owings Mills, Maryland, pleaded guilty to one count of racketeering conspiracy and one count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute 100 grams or more of a mixture or substance containing heroin.
The guilty plea was announced by Acting United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Stephen M. Schenning and Special Agent in Charge Gordon B. Johnson of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Baltimore Field Office.
Fmr @BaltimorePolice detective Gondo pleads guilty Ct. 1 of racketeering indictment and a separate drug charge. Max is 20 and 40yrs resp
— Brian Kuebler (@BrianfromABC2) October 12, 2017
Gondo joined the Baltimore Police Department on November 29, 2005 and was later assigned to the Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), a division of the Baltimore Police Department. According to the plea agreement, Gondo schemed to steal money, property, and narcotics by detaining victims, entering residences, conducting traffic stops, and swearing out false search warrant affidavits.
In addition, Gondo prepared and submitted false official incident and arrest reports, reports of property seized from arrestees, and charging documents. The false reports concealed the fact that Gondo and his co-conspirators had stolen money, property, and narcotics from individuals.
According to his plea agreement, beginning in 2015, Gondo robbed civilians he detained and in some cases arrested and stole money and drugs from them. Gondo shared the proceeds with co-defendants Jemell Rayam, Wayne Jenkins, Daniel Hersl, Marcus Taylor, and others, and on other occasions, he kept all of the proceeds for himself.
Gondo participated in eight robberies from March 2015 through July 2016. Gondo admitted that he was armed with his BPD service firearm during the robberies, that individual victims of the robberies were physically restrained to facilitate the commission of the offense, and that he authored false and fraudulent incident reports and other official documents in some cases in order to conceal his criminal conduct and otherwise obstruct justice.
On October 5, 2015, Gondo and his co-conspirators robbed a drug dealer after Gondo and Rayam placed a tracking device on the victim’s car without court authorization so that they could rob his apartment when he was not home. Gondo acted as a look out while Rayam and Glen Kyle Wells entered the victim’s apartment.
Rayam and Wells stole a Rolex watch, a firearm, $12,000 to $14,000 in cash, and at least 800 grams of heroin. After the robbery, Gondo and his co-conspirators split the money they had stolen. Wells took the Rolex, the gun, and the drugs and sold some of the drugs. Rayam also sold some of the drugs and shared proceeds with Gondo.
Gondo admitted to committing multiple robberies with Sergeant Thomas Allers. For example, on March 11, 2015, Gondo, Rayam, and Allers searched a residence and discovered a large quantity of cash. Rayam, Gondo and Allers each took some of the cash. Gondo took between $8,000 and $10,000.
Gondo admitted that he sold a seized gun and marijuana to a drug dealer. In June 2016, Gondo, Rayam and Jenkins conducted a car stop and then went to the driver’s residence, without a warrant, and seized a 9mm handgun and a pound of marijuana.
After Jenkins directed the sale of the gun and marijuana in order to repay a debt Rayam owed Jenkins for drugs, Gondo arranged for an associate of his, a drug dealer, to buy the marijuana and handgun.
On July 8, 2016, Gondo and his co-defendants Hersl and Rayam detained two victims after a car stop. Gondo stole money from one of the victims. At Jenkins’s direction, Hersl, Rayam, and Gondo transported the two victims to a BPD office to interrogate them.
Jenkins told his co-conspirators to treat him like he was the U.S. Attorney. After speaking with one of the individuals, Jenkins, Hersl, Gondo, and Rayam then transported both of the victims to their home and robbed them of $20,000. Jenkins, Hersl, Rayam, and Gondo divided the $20,000.
In a separate seven-count indictment, Gondo and five co-defendants were charged with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute heroin as part of the Shropshire drug trafficking organization (DTO). According to the indictment, the conspirators primarily distributed heroin near the Alameda Shopping Center in Baltimore.
A jury trial against the five co-defendants, Antonio Shropshire, Antoine Washington, Glen Wells, Alexander Campbell, and Omari Thomas, is scheduled to begin October 16, 2017 in courtroom 1A.
Gondo provided sensitive law enforcement information to other conspirators in order to help the DTO and protect his co-conspirators. According to his plea agreement, Gondo admitted to providing protection, information and tips to his co-conspirator and co-defendant Antonio Shropshire about how to avoid being arrested.
For example, on March 31, 2016, Gondo alerted Shropshire, an alleged drug dealer, that the Drug Enforcement Administration had installed a GPS tracking device on his vehicle. Shropshire, under Gondo’s instruction, then removed the GPS device and placed it on another vehicle.
According to the plea agreement, Gondo also admitted that he routinely submitted false and fraudulent individual overtime reports defrauding the Baltimore Police Department and the citizens of the State of Maryland.
On these reports, Gondo falsely certified that he worked his entire regularly assigned shifts, when he did not, and that he worked additional hours for which he received overtime pay, when he had not worked all and in some cases any of those overtime hours. Gondo also admitted that he submitted false and fraudulent overtime reports on behalf of his co-defendants.
Lastly, Gondo admitted to obstructing law enforcement by alerting his co-defendants about potential investigations of their criminal conduct, coaching each other to give false testimony to investigators from the Internal Investigations Division of the BPD, and turning off his body cameras to avoid recording encounters with civilians.
Gondo sentencing not scheduled yet but now half of the @BaltimorePolice ofcs involved in that indictment have pleaded guilty. @ABC2NEWS
— Brian Kuebler (@BrianfromABC2) October 12, 2017
Gondo faces a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison for the narcotics conspiracy conviction, with a minimum mandatory of 5 years in prison.
