Just in case it hasn’t already been made clear, the sentencing of Karl Kado leaves little doubt as to which trophy prosecutors would most like to hang on their wall in the city corruption scandal. Kwame Kilpatrick remains the Alpha and Omega of the prosecutorial fixations.
Kado admitted to paying king’s ransoms to Kilpatrick and his father Bernard. (The former mayor’s chief of staff, Derrick Miller, was also allegedly a payee.) It is illegal to bribe elected officials, of course. But Kado somehow convinced prosecutors (and the judge) that he was more victim than corruptor. That Kado would walk away from the Cobo scandal with no jail time after having spread around hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep his Cobo contracts flowing seems incredible — until you look at the target further down the shooting range. Prosecutors are showing us a fairly simple approach; if you assist in the investigation (James Rosendall) you’ll get by with a minimum of correctional discomfort. Those who refuse to assist (Rayford Jackson) can plan on doing harder time. (All of this recent activity makes the upcoming sentencing of Monica Conyers all the more fascinating.) But Kado’s deal appears to have been sweetened greatly by his willingness to lead investigators right into the dragon’s lair. Reportedly, he’s singing a pretty clear song about handing over money directly to then Mayor Kilpatrick. He also reportedly wore a wire.
The text messages were juicy reading. But you can have those. I’ll take the Kado tapes, thank you very much. They may give us a much clearer and definitive look at what the feds are hoping to characterize as a full-blown criminal enterprise.
-Devin
We truly reap what we sew. The field that is Kwame is overdue for the harvest.