Ted White: Lee's Summit has Broken Their Promise

Ted White: Lee's Summit has Broken Their Promise

KANSAS CITY, MO - Ted White says that he has a simple message for officials in Lee's Summit: It's time to make things right.

White, who served over five years in prison after he was falsely accused of sexually abusing his stepdaughter, is returning to Lee's Summit from his new home in Utah to address the city council as his fight to get the $16 million in damages awarded to him by a federal jury gets under way.

"My family paid for four trials," said White, who has since remarried and has a new child as he rebuilds his life in Utah. White says that over the past 12 years he has lost his family, his business and his parents went bankrupt because of the false child molestation charges.

White was eventually freed after a jury heard evidence that his ex-wife, Tina, was having an affair with the Lee's Summit Police detective investigating his case and had conspired to withhold evidence that would have cleared him.

"It could happen to any citizens of Lee's Summit, and it comes down to what's right and what's wrong," said White.

A federal court made a final ruling against the detective two weeks ago, upholding the $16 million dollar civil verdict in White's favor. The city of lee's Summit signed an agreement prior to the civil trial would pay damages if its detective lost the lawsuit. But now the Lee's Summit Mayor Randy Rhoads says that a city ordinance that reads if a city employee violates someone's rights the city isn't responsible means that it would be against the law for the city to pay White.

Rhoads says even though the city signed the agreement with White, "it was not known then that the jury would issue a verdict two years later that the defendants violated Mr. White's constitutional rights."

"There's a promise to pay and they have broken that promise," said White.

Lee' Summit officials would not talk to FOX 4 about the White case on Wednesday. White says that the judgment is building interest at the rate of almost $900 a day, and says that he will take the city back to court if he has to, but that he hopes that the city will do the right thing.

Ted White's supporters plan to hold a rally on Thursday at 5:00 p.m. in front of City Hall prior to the City Council meeting. There is also a petition circulating in support of White.

"Nobody wins in this situation, but if they force me to fight the people who get hurt are the taxpayers because I have to fight," said White. "I've been put in that position to defend my rights for 12 years."