We have an editorial in today’s Eagle about Attorney General Phill Kline’s 2005 legal bills, which were discussed in an earlier post. I had some additional thoughts: That at least Kline’s bills, unlike those of former Attorney General Carla Stovall (in photo) in the infamous case of the tobacco litigation, don’t find Kline handing off legal work to his old law firm. But that it’s interesting to see former Attorney General Robert Stephan and Rep. Lance Kinzer, R-Olathe, among the outside lawyers. And that U.S. Supreme Court appearance and all, Kline’s 2005 travel expenses, $157,000, also paled in comparison with Stovall’s last full year, $256,000.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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10 Comments
Wow. So this part missed the lead editorial today. Shocking. Guess it was edited for “space.” Guffaw.
Did Kline even have an old law firm to feather?
Kline might not have feathered the bed of a previous law firm, but he paid outrageously large “expert” witness fees to a infamous anti-choice national figure. I have never heard of such a large fee paid to a “witness” in a legal case. This was just a way to funnel taxpayer money to his favorite political right-wing interest group.
The Eagle should be commended for reporting on Thursday the $191,000 spent by the Attorney General’s Office to defend the state against the tax-payer paid law suit by Schools for Fair Funding. The law suit also cost the State Board of Education about $50,000 in legal fees.
Where is the press coverage, and were is the outrage over the $2 million of tax dollars spent by Schools for Fair Funding to raise taxes? Does this make sense?
See:Over $2 MILLION of Kansas Tax DollarsUsed by Lobbyists and Attorneysto Sue the State of Kansas to Increase Tax Dollars?http://www.kansasmeadowlark.com/2006/02-13/index.htm
The Eagle article said “Alan Rupe of Wichita, lead lawyer for the plaintiff school districts, declined to release figures on last year’s costs of pursuing the case.”
We’ll only find out out what Schools for Fair Funding spent in 2005 when they file their IRS 990 and someone requests it from the IRS in Ogden, UT, which likely will be Sept 2006. SFF knows a clever way to keep their IRS 990 from appearing online at GuideStar.org, specifically http://www.guidestar.org/pqShowGsReport.do?npoId=100490794.
KS Meadowlark. You really amaze me. You do good work. Thanks for that.
Stovall gave millions of dollars to her old law firm with the settlement of the tobacco dollars.
It might be interesting to see if the budget for the Attorney General over the last four years even compares to the millions and millions that Carla paid her law firm to basicly do nothing because the money was coming. She did not even attempt to put the contract out for bid. There were other firms that could have done the job. But then she could not have paid off her friends with your dollars.
Ruby, you have a good memory. As I recall, the amount was some $27 million dollars. The tobacco fund was known across America by lawyers themselves as the “lawyer enrichment fund.” Big payoff for minimal effort, all at taxpayer expense.
The Wichita EAGLE should assign its best muckraking reporter to investigate the Kansas Tobacco fund to see if it’s still paying off and to whom. Perhaps the EAGLE could earn a Pulitzer prize for this one.
And did it convince anyone to stop smoking? Probably not.
This from the Phill Kline access Kansas site:
“Phill Kline practiced law full time as a litigator with the Kansas Cityfirm Blackwell Sanders until he was elected to represent Shawneein the Kansas House of Representatives in 1992.
“During his eight years in the House, Phill Kline was recognized as a leader inthe fight for crime victims’ rights, welfare reform, and more responsible government. He authored six new crime victims’ rights laws, co-wrote Kansas’ welfare reform, and was recognized as “Legislator of the Year” by the state’s developmentally disabled and mental health communities. Kline served as chairman of the House Taxation Committee for three years and chairman of the House Appropriations Committee for one year.”
So, we’re up to 2000, what law firm was Phill with from 2000-2004? It’s not that he might be a pretend lawyer, would it?
Please clarify for this skeptical Wichitan, please. Thanks.
JWink,
Good job! I could not remember the amount I just recalled the issue was big in Topeka that year and Stovall was not held accountable for any of it.
At least in Stovall’s case they won!