According to a letter obtained by Free Press reporter Matt Helms, Krystal Crittendon says there is an irony in her taking legal action that the state now says could force Detroit to go broke this week.
Crittendon, the top city lawyer at the center of a firestorm over her legal challenge of a financial stability agreement with the state designed to save Detroit from bankruptcy, wrote a letter to colleagues in the city’s law department. In it, according to Helms, she says she argued against changing Detroit’s city charter last year to give too broad independence to the position of corporation counsel, or lead city attorney.
Despite her misgivings, the city’s charter revision commission granted the law department a new level of autonomy from the mayor’s office, largely with former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s misuse of his authority while allegations of corruption were investigated in mind.
