Detroit — Compuware Corp. CEO Peter Karmanos and the mother of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick testified Wednesday in front of a federal grand jury probing corruption in Detroit.
Karmanos testified about a $60,000 loan he made to Kilpatrick shortly after he was released from jail as well as money he gave to the Kilpatrick Civic Fund nonprofit organization, a person familiar with his testimony said.
U.S. Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, D-Detroit, the mayor’s mother, confirmed her own testimony. “This morning, I testified briefly before the grand jury,” she said in a statement. “I answered all questions honestly and to the best of my ability.”
As his mother testified before the grand jury, her son was several blocks away in Wayne Circuit Court facing accusations he violated terms of his criminal probation.
A grand jury investigating Detroit City Hall corruption and the former mayor has been sitting regularly on Wednesdays.
Cheeks Kilpatrick has said she is not the target of any investigation. She has not disclosed the subject matter of the subpoena she received, first reported by The News on March 10.
Karmanos is one of four area businessmen who each loaned the former mayor $60,000 around the time he was released from the Wayne County Jail after serving 99 days on obstruction-of-justice charges. In February 2009, Karmanos hired Kilpatrick as a salesman at Compuware subsidiary Covisint in Texas.
Karmanos could not be reached, and Compuware spokesman Bill McGraw declined comment.
Finances investigated
A person familiar with the case, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Karmanos is also not a target and his testimony relates to an intense FBI and IRS investigation of the former mayor’s personal finances, as well as the Kilpatrick Civic Fund.
The fund, set up in 1999 with a stated purpose of improving neighborhoods and educating citizens, is suspected of being used as a piggy bank for Kilpatrick’s personal expenses, people familiar with the investigation said.
The fact Karmanos gave Kilpatrick a job is not an issue with federal investigators, said the source who confirmed Karmanos’ grand jury appearance.
Other area businessmen who made loans to Kilpatrick have received subpoenas for records, though they have not been called to testify before the grand jury, the source said. Businessmen Roger Penske, Dan Gilbert and Jim Nicholson also made $60,000 loans to Kilpatrick. It could not be immediately determined whether each of them had been subpoenaed for records.
Andrea Bragg, an aide to Cheeks Kilpatrick, also received a grand jury subpoena. There was no word from Cheeks Kilpatrick’s office on whether Bragg also testified Wednesday.
The grand jury has been investigating City Hall “pay to play” allegations involving the former mayor and his father, business consultant Bernard N. Kilpatrick, who is the ex-husband of Cheeks Kilpatrick.
So far, the long-running and wide-ranging Detroit investigation, which dates to at least 2005, has resulted in 10 guilty pleas, including one plea from a former Southfield city councilman whose case was a spinoff from the Detroit investigation.
Legal experts said a spousal privilege that respects confidences between a husband and wife would only apply to matters that happened up to the time the Kilpatricks divorced. There is no privilege that applies to communication between a mother and her son, experts said.
Ruling set for April
Meanwhile, Wayne Circuit Judge David Groner set April 20 as the date he will announce whether he heard enough evidence in Wednesday’s daylong hearing to determine if Kwame Kilpatrick has violated conditions in the text message scandal that have allowed him to remain free and living in Texas.
Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff, Christine Beatty, were charged with perjury, obstruction of justice and other felony crimes. Kilpatrick resigned as mayor in the fall of 2008 and agreed to pay the city $1 million restitution. Both pleaded guilty and served time in jail.
Groner could return Kilpatrick to jail for violating probation.
Kilpatrick himself asked his probation supervisor last week whether he should prepare to return to jail, the woman, Beverly Smith, testified on Wednesday.
During the hearing, Groner repeatedly accused Kilpatrick’s lawyer, Michael Alan Schwartz, of “wasting the court’s time” with questions that weren’t aimed directly at refuting the charges.
Groner even put Kilpatrick’s New York City public relations agent on the witness stand, over the defense’s objections, to ask who is paying him and how much. Mike Paul said his contract is with Schwartz, but he has been a friend of Kilpatrick’s for years. The pay: $1 so far, and Paul said he’s not decided how much he will charge later, if anything.
Papers filed in stripper suit
In another case involving the Kilpatrick family, Texas attorney Bobbie R. Edmonds filed appearances in the Tamara “Strawberry” Greene case late Tuesday on behalf of Bernard Kilpatrick and former Detroit first lady Carlita Kilpatrick.
Edmonds filed the court papers soon after Chief U.S. District Judge Gerald E. Rosen said both Kilpatrick family members could be deposed in the case, in which the family of a slain stripper is suing the city, alleging obstruction of her murder investigation.
Edmonds, citing a gag order in the case, would not discuss whether she would make further efforts to quash the subpoenas.
Source:Paul Egan and Doug Guthrie / The Detroit News
