Monday, October 31, 2011

Ex-employee fired by Turkia Mullin says she told him to illegally divert money to nonprofit. (Wayne County Airport Authority)

A former Wayne County employee, who was fired by embattled former economic development director Turkia Awada Mullin, has filed suit against her in Wayne County Circuit Court, saying she asked him to illegally divert money from a federal program designed to help low-income communities into a nonprofit agency Mullin headed.

Taylor Segue III was a senior executive project manager for the Economic Development Growth Engine, working for Mullin from September 2009 until he was fired in April 2011.

In the course of his job, according to the lawsuit, Segue discovered that several local banks held nearly $175,000 in Wayne County funds. That money was generated from fees paid by investors who got tax credits through the federal program to rehabilitate neighborhoods and create jobs for low-income residents.

Segue wanted to transfer the funds out of the accounts so they could be used to administer the federal program, but he said that Mullin wanted the money transferred to the Wayne County Business Development Corp., a nonprofit agency headed by Mullin, who got an extra $75,000 from the agency on top of her $200,000 county salary.

Scott Wintner, a spokesman for Mullin, said the lawsuit is “the unfortunate reaction to events by a disgruntled employee.

“Not only did she never ask this individual to transfer money, she doesn’t have the authorization to do that anyway,” Wintner said.

Segue said in his lawsuit: “To divert the funds to the WCBDC would be improper and illegal because the funds had to be used for the program purposes."

Segue offered to write a resolution authorizing the transfer that would have to be approved by the full Wayne County Detroit Community Development Entity, which administered the federal program, but Mullin persisted, Segue said in the lawsuit.

When he declined the demand, he said, Mullin fired him.

“Taylor is still looking for work,” said Michael Pitt, Segue’s attorney.

His lawsuit has been assigned to Circuit Court Judge John Murphy. Mullin will have 21 days to respond to the legal action. Segue hasn’t asked for specific damages except for “the amount he is found to be entitled to.”

It comes on the same day that the Wayne County Airport Authority is meeting to determine Mullin’s fate as executive director of the airport. She got the new job in August and received a $200,000 severance payment after voluntarily leaving her job as economic development director for Wayne County.

http://www.freep.com

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