Former Hartford police chief convicted in drug case

PAW PAW, Mich. (WOOD) — Hartford's former police chief will spend years in prison after authorities say she stole drugs from a police department dumpster.

Tressa Beltran was sentenced Monday to three years, four months and 20 years in prison.

Search warrants show that during the summer of 2022, the Van Buren County Sheriff's Office received a tip that Beltran was stealing narcotics. In response, investigators left two marked bottles of hydrocodone in a medicine box at the police station. When they returned to get the contents of the box, according to the documents, they found that a number of pills from the marked bottles were missing. Investigators raided the department on June 30, 2022. They said they found several prescription bottles and loose hydrocodone pills in Beltran's purse and that she admitted to stealing medications from the trash box and using them .

Beltran resigned from her employment in January 2023. She was officially charged in May of the same year.

She pleaded guilty in April of this year to two misdemeanors: delivery or possession of a controlled substance and use of a computer to commit a crime. In exchange for his plea, several other charges were dismissed.

The felony conviction means she may never be a Michigan police officer again.