Kilpatrick could plead guilty at 9 a.m. if deal reached on jail time
By JIM SCHAEFER, M.L. ELRICK and JOE SWICKARD • FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS • September 3, 2008
Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick spent tonight wrestling with whether to enter a plea deal when he enters a downtown courtroom this morning, a move that will cost him his job — even his freedom — but will finally end a scandal that has swamped the city and state for nearly eight months.
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After a frenetic evening, when a tentative plea deal was alternately announced by the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office and then postponed, Kilpatrick is due in court Thursday at 9 a.m. before Wayne Circuit Judge David Groner in his criminal perjury case stemming from the text message scandal. A plea deal could be announced there — if all sides commit.
James Thomas, one of Kilpatrick’s attorneys, said this evening the mayor was negotiating jail time, which would be a change in Kilpatrick’s earlier reported stance that he would not agree to any deal that would put him behind bars.
“I am told that part of the negotiation is related to jail time,” Thomas said. “I’m not sure what the final agreement is, but you can expect that that was probably one of the most important parts of the agreement.”
One personfamiliar with this evening’s negotiations said jail time would be part of the deal, if it is reached, but the person would not commit to a specific number of days.
Also being negotiated was the 38-year-old Kilpatrick’s potential ability to run for future office and the terms and length of any probation he might receive. The mayor wanted more time to consider the situation, the person said, explaining why this afternoon’s court hearing was canceled.
At one point this afternoon, Kilpatrick met with his department directors and staff at a regular meeting. The subject of his criminal case was raised, said a source, who spoke on condition of anonymity because it was a private meeting. The subject of the mayor’s leaving office came up, but Kilpatrick did not commit one way or the other and urged his top staff to remain focused, this source said.
Meanwhile, Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who began historic proceedings today to help her decide whether she will remove Kilpatrick from office, postponed Day 2 of her own hearing by an hour Thursday, to 10 a.m., to give Kilpatrick’s situation a chance to develop this morning.
If Kilpatrick pleads guilty and resigns, her hearing would become meaningless and would be canceled.
The announcement of a possible deal today, sent in an e-mail at 4:41 p.m. from the prosecutor’s office with the subject line “Defendant Kilpatrick To Plea Guilty in Text Scandal Case,” sent journalists scurrying from Granholm’s hearing room in Detroit’s New Center area to the courthouse downtown.
By 5 p.m., word began to spread that the deal — which was supposed to be announced at 5:15 p.m. — would not happen.
In another e-mail sent at 5:44 p.m., the prosecutor’s office backed off the plea agreement, saying only that Kilpatrick would be in court this morning for a routine hearing before Groner.
Granholm continued with her proceeding, which featured testimony from key figures in the text message scandal. The governor had to vocally intervene at one point between Kilpatrick general counsel Sharon McPhail and Mike Stefani, the lawyer for three former cops, who obtained incriminating text messages last year between Kilpatrick and his then-chief of staff Christine Beatty.
The Free Press published excerpts of those messages in January, showing Kilpatrick and Beatty lied under oath at the whistle-blower trial brought by Stefani’s clients last fall. The newspaper’s published investigation sparked the scandal, and in March Worthy announced felony charges against Kilpatrick and Beatty. The pair face multiple counts of perjury, misconduct in office, obstruction of justice and conspiracy.
On Tuesday, after courts cleared the way for Granholm to honor the request by the Detroit City Council and hold the removal hearing, Worthy hardened her stance on jail time for Kilpatrick. The mayor had agreed to plead guilty to two of the eight felonies in the perjury case, leaving him with a criminal record that could not be expunged. The prosecutor insisted that he serve at least six months, which was up from earlier reports that she had offered four months.
A number of Detroit pastors have recently urged Worthy to relax her demands on the amount of jail time Kilpatrick would be required to serve, according to a person close to the negotiations.
The mayor also faces two felony assault charges. That case, which remains pending, is being prosecuted by the office of state Attorney General Mike Cox.
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