Ex-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick will be appearing before a home crowd after all.
U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds, in a brief hearing this afternoon, rejected a request for a change of venue, saying Kilpatrick and his co-defendants could get a fair trial in the home town of Detroit. The ruling clears the way for opening statements to begin Friday at 9 a.m.
Kilpatrick's attorney James Thomas had argued that a pretrial media frenzy made it impossible for Kilpatrick to get a fair trial. He also cited a recent Detroit Free Press article that focused on the lone holdout in another trial involving defendant Bobby Ferguson, and how the juror may have lied about her background. Thomas said that article could send a message that the media may hound jurors.
The prosecution and the judge weren't buying any of that.
"I'm sure it's going to be no surprise to anyone in this courtroom that I'm going to deny this motion," Edmunds said. "There just isn't anything in this case from which the court can presume prejudice and warrant a change of venue."
Change of venues are rarely granted, even in high-profile cases where there's been a fair amount of pretrial publicity. Co-defendants in the Kilpatrick case include his close friend Bobby Ferguson, Kilpatrick's dad Bernard and former water department boss Victor Mercardo. They are charged with running a criminal enterprise out of city hall that took bribes and shook down contractors.
Kilpatrick had recently complained that he couldn't get a fair trial in Detroit and that there were far too few black jurors in the jury pools in federal court in Detroit. The jurors are selected from Southeast Michigan.
But interestingly, 5 of the 12 jurors selected this week are black and one is Hispanic.
