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Kilpatricks Want Out Of Depositions

The wife and father of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick are trying to avoid questioning  in a lawsuit filed over the shooting death of an exotic dancer.

Carlita and Bernard Kilpatrick have filed motions asking a federal judge to stop their depositions in the case of Tamara Greene.

Seven years ago, Greene was found shot to death a few months after she was reportedly hired to dance at a party at the mayor's residence.  The rumored Manoogian Mansion party has never been proven.

Charlie Langton, WWJ and Fox 2 Legal Analyst, said the tactic could backfire.

"The motion to quash is a public relations disaster because it really makes the Kilpatricks look guilty," Langton said.  "The media will be talking about it and everybody is going to be asking, 'Oh my gosh, what do they have to hide?'"

Langton said if they didn't have anything to hide, they would go ahead and talk.

"To give a deposition in this case, I would think certainly there are a lot of overlaps that they don't want to discuss, and they have a right not to incriminate themselves," Langton said.

"The bottom line here, whether or not there was a party is irrelevant," Langton said.  "Did Kwame Kilpatrick put a stop to this investigation which would then lead to some civil cause of action for the family of the deceased, that's really the issue in the case."

Langton said he doesn't think the judge will stop the deposition.

Meantime, Norman Yatooma, the attorney representing  Greene's family, said he will ask the judge to sanction Carlita and Bernard Kilpatrick for trying to get out of their depositions.

"She's said to have been the one at the party who assaulted Tammy Greene," Yatooma said.

"I want to sit her down and have a talk with her, and find out if she's remorseful for assaulting Tammy Greene with a wooden object as was suggested in the police report," Yatooma said.

"Mike Cox's investigation is a rumor," Yatooma said.  "His investigation was a joke.  He didn't even himself interview Carlita Kilpatrick."

"And the interview he conducted of Kwame Kilpatrick was done with the Michigan State Police fighting at the other end of the door, being refused access to this investigation," he said.

Yatooma said he expects the judge to deny Carlita and Bernard Kilpatrick's motion.

"It's absurd, there's no basis to suggest they shouldn't be deposed... We endured a threat from Bernard Kilpatrick, or at least purported to be from Bernard Kilpatrick, to keep us from deposing him, so that's reason in and of itself," Yatooma said.

Former Mayor Kilpatrick is scheduled to give his deposition in the case on Thursday.  He's accused in the lawsuit of obstructing the investigation into Greene's death.

(Copyright 2010 by WWJ.  All Rights Reserved.)

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