Detroit mayor sues to try to stop removal hearing

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Desperate to save his political life, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is suing to stop Gov. Jennifer Granholm from holding an extraordinary hearing next week that could lead to his eviction from office for misconduct.

Some of the argument in the lawsuit filed Thursday are dry and technical, attacking the removal law as "vague" and "subjective."

But much of the lawsuit is personal, too. It discloses for the first time that Granholm tried to broker a deal in May to end her fellow Democrat's perjury case and sweep him from office.

"It was apparent at this meeting that the governor did not presume Kilpatrick's innocence," the mayor's legal team wrote. "To the contrary, at this meeting, the governor and her staff had prepared a blackboard scenario in which his presumption of innocence was ignored and significantly undercut.

"The governor explained that no matter the evidence, Kilpatrick had to resign because it was making Michigan look bad," according to the lawsuit.

The bottom line from the mayor: Granholm is unfit to judge him three months later.

"We will review it and respond as appropriate," Granholm spokeswoman Liz Boyd said of the lawsuit.

Wayne County Circuit Judge Robert Ziolkowski was expected to hear arguments Friday on whether to halt removal proceedings. He earlier ruled that the city charter doesn't contain language allowing the council to punish Kilpatrick by forfeiture.

The Detroit City Council is requesting Kilpatrick be removed from office under a provision in the Michigan Constitution that allows a governor to bounce officials for misconduct.

The mayor is accused of misleading council members into approving an $8.4 million settlement with three fired police officers. The council says it didn't know the deal included provisions to keep confidential romantic text messages between Kilpatrick and a top aide.

The governor was 1,200 miles away Thursday in Denver at the Democratic National Convention, plugging Michigan at every turn as a crucial state in the presidential election between Barack Obama and John McCain.

Granholm said she wanted to move beyond the Detroit crisis and focus on "jobs in Michigan, and diversifying our economy, and getting Barack Obama elected as president."

Kilpatrick was supposed to attend the convention as a superdelegate, but he's restricted to Wayne, Oakland and Macomb counties and must wear an electronic tether as a condition of his bond.

His spokesman said the lawsuit was necessary to protect the mayor. "As a result of the governor's decision to bow to political pressures and move forward with her hearing, we have no choice," Marcus Reese said.

He said Granholm's "ability to be fair and impartial in presiding over the hearings is doubtful."

The lawsuit was filed after Granholm's top legal adviser, Kelly Keenan, held a conference call with attorneys to iron out the procedure for the removal hearing.

Besides the hearing, the mayor faces 10 felony counts in separate perjury and assault cases in Wayne County Circuit Court.

In the first case, Kilpatrick and ex-top aide Christine Beatty are charged with perjury, conspiracy, misconduct and obstruction of justice. They are accused of lying during the 2007 whistle-blowers' trial about having an extramarital affair and their roles in the firing of a deputy police chief.

Text messages from Beatty's city-issued pager contradicted their testimony, leading Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy to file charges against the pair in March.

The other charges stem from allegations that the mayor shoved a prosecutor's investigator into another in July as they were attempting to serve a subpoena in the perjury case to a Kilpatrick friend.

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Associated Press writer Kathy Barks Hoffman in Denver contributed to this report.

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