Carlita Kilpatrick, Wife of Convicted Former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, Fights Paying One Dime of the $1 Million Restitution He Agreed to,

as Part of His Plea-Bargain
Mrs. Kilpatrick Has Not Said Whether She Wishes to Pay Restitution to the Family of Murdered Stripper Tamara Greene

 
The convict
 

The convict’s scowling wife
 

The murdered stripper
 

[See my report, “Detroit’s Gangster Mayor Reportedly to Accept Plea Today: Kilpatrick Era Over … for Now”]

 

Kilpatrick’s wife wants her money
By Mildred Gaddis
April 21, 2010 at 6:41 a.m.

Carlita Kilpatrick, wife of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, says in a federal lawsuit filed in Texas on Tuesday that she and her family can’t get a fair shake in Michigan courts and wants her money back.

She asked U.S. District Judge Terry Means in Ft. Worth to stop Wayne County and Prosecutor Kym Worthy from taking further action to capture the assets of her and her three children to satisfy the $1-million restitution owed by her husband to the City of Detroit as part of his guilty plea in the text message scandal.

The 12-page complaint said Carlita Kilpatrick and her children “believe and allege that they will not get justice and fairness from the court of the State of Michigan.”

She says she is suing in Texas because the family lives there and the assets she is trying to protect are there, too. Carlita Kilpatrick wants the federal judge to order Michigan courts to reimburse her for any of her or the children’s money already paid toward her husband’s restitution.

Among other claims, Kilpatrick said she gave her husband $26,000 from her own funds to get a better price on a $35,000 family vehicle. She said Michigan courts used her contribution to increase Kwame Kilpatrick’s repayments.

She also said that $50,000 that she and the kids got from well-wishers in Michigan, as well as her share of the couple’s $23,369 joint federal income tax refund for 2008, were improperly used by the Michigan courts to set Kwame Kilpatrick’s restitution payments.

Worthy and Wayne County “are continuing to seek these assets belonging (to her and the children) to partially satisfy her husband’s restitution” without due process, she said.

Steven Winter, a Wayne State University constitutional law professor, gave the lawsuit little chance of success.

“I would not expect this to be long-lived,” Winter said. “Generally, federal courts won’t interfere with an ongoing state process.”

Source:freep.com/JOE SWICKARD and DAVID ASHENFELTER