Was the contract that almost cost Wayne County taxpayers $200K legit?
Action News confronts Turkia Mullin
Photographer: WXYZ
Copyright 2011 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Posted: 10/04/2011
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By: Kim Russell
WXYZ - An Action News investigation exposed the $200,000 severance payment Wayne County gave to Turkia Mullin when she voluntarily left her job as Economic Development chief. She left to accept a job that paid her $250,000 as the new CEO of Detroit Metro Airport.
Action News Investigator Heather Catallo asked Mullin why she was receiving such a large payout to take a better opportunity. She said she had negotiated it in her employment contract.
Action News asked for a copy, and legal experts analyzed the “contract.” It was actually a vague undated letter signed only by Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano.
Legal experts said the fact that the letter promising hundreds of thousands of dollars was undated and informal was questionable.
After the Action News investigation, Mullin said she would return the severance payment to the cash-strapped county.
She refused to answer questions about the change in decision, other than to say in a written statement, "I spoke with Mr. Ficano this afternoon and we mutually agreed that giving the money back is the best thing to do for both the county and the airport. This issue has become such a significant distraction that it has interfered with our ability to focus on operations. It's time to put this behind us and get back to work."
Action News wanted to know when the letter or “contract” was written. Was it written before she took her job with the county, or after the fact?
We tracked Turkia Mullin down to ask her this simple question. A confrontation followed. To see what happened, click on the attached video clip.
Copyright 2011 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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