The Kwame Kilpatrick saga has always read like bad fiction. Testimony about the Kilpatrick Enterprise’s handling of their (alleged) ill-gotten fortunes only puts that reality into clearer focus.
Bobby Ferguson is supposed to have made numerous ATM withdrawals that added up to several million dollars over a couple years. Kilpatrick allegedly hid cash in a vacuum cleaner and his shoe. When it was all said and done, the IRS believes he spent over a $500,000 during his term that can’t be traced in any way back to his mayoral salary.
If anyone was expecting this case to play out like "The Wire," they were sorely mistaken. Remember when Prop Joe and Levy help Marlo launder his money into off-shore accounts? Yeah, well, the Kilpatrick Enterprise apparently wasn't that slick.
These guys were pure "Office Space." If the prosecution’s allegations are true, you can almost imagine Kwame and Bernard chewing on Little Caeser's pizza while Ferguson looked up money laundering in a dictionary.
They might have gotten away with it if they had just asked a magazine salesman to introduce them to some drug dealers.
It’s bad enough Kilpatrick (according to prosecutors) sold his constituents down the river for a pile of money and Tony Soave’s Pistons tickets but their ham-fisted approach to crime (allegedly) is just embarrassing.
It’s one thing to be taken by a first-rate grifter, there’s always some honor in being beaten by the best. To get fleeced by these pedestrian hacks, well, we should all hang our heads in shame. Team Kilpatrick is making Detroiters look like the sort of rubes who fall for Nigerian prince email scams.
Regardless of how this trial, still in its very early stages, turns out, there's a lesson here for voters: We all need to be a little more skeptical in the voting booth.
Detroit voters (assisted by his suburban donors) re-elected Kilpatrick in 2005 with their eyes wide open. The EPU overtime shenanigans, the Navigator, the unpaid city credit card bills were all public record at that point. Kwame (praise Jesus) acknowledged the errors of his ways (amen) and promised to get right with God (hallelujah). The Jimmy Swaggart-style crocodile tears were enough to dupe Detroit into giving him a second term.
That anyone believed Kilpatrick's act is a testament to our collective willful ignorance. Real repentance is shown through acts, not spoken with words. Kilpatrick never demonstrated anything that suggested he was really a changed man. Still, enough people fell for his cynical act like gullible isn't in the dictionary.
No wonder he and his buddies (allegedly) thought they could run this half-baked criminal operation without detection. They likely thought we were too dumb to catch on.
