Three days after Phill Kline testified in a Sedgwick County courtroom about the handling of abortion files, copies of those records were mailed to the Virginia city where the former Kansas prosecutor had taken a new job.
Most of the morning’s testimony consisted of verbal fencing between Kline and lawyer Dan Monnat, another member of Tiller’s legal team.
During the first two minutes of his testimony Kline answered “I don’t recall” 10 times.
Just before court recessed for lunch, Monnat began asking Kline about his knowledge of an affair between his successor as attorney general, Paul Morrison, and Linda Carter, who worked for Kline after he became Johnson County district attorney.
Linda Carter said she and Paul Morrison nearly broke off their affair after a heated argument over Wichita abortion provider George Tiller.
Morrison was just months into his new job as Kansas attorney general. Carter was his lover and worked with his predecessor at the Johnson County District Attorney’s Office.
“Chad and Shannon Floyd and their families have had to endure three years of accusations, innuendo and rumor that have been absolutely false,” said Wichita attorney Dan Monnat, who represented Chad Floyd.
Lawyers Dan Monnat and Kurt Kerns of Wichita argued for the defense that there were people near the Floyds’ house that night who would have heard the gunshots — but didn’t — and that a different friend of theirs showed up unexpectedly when the killing was supposedly taking place.
Phill Kline’s broad interpretation of a law governing how health care providers report teen sexual activity fueled his investigation of Wichita abortion provider George Tiller, the doctor’s lawyers said Tuesday in Sedgwick County District Court.
Tiller’s defense team is trying to persuade a judge to throw out 19 misdemeanor charges against the doctor because they say the case is based on evidence that Kline collected through abuse of his authority as the state’s top law enforcement officer.
Attorneys for abortion provider George Tiller tried to show in court Monday that former Attorney General Phill Kline was planning to prosecute Tiller even before he took office.
Tiller made a rare court appearance as he watched as one of his attorneys sparred with Kline, who launched an investigation of Tiller more than five years ago.
Phill Kline will face questioning next week by lawyers representing the Wichita abortion doctor he pursued for years as the state’s top prosecutor.
Kline, the former Kansas attorney general and current Johnson County district attorney, is on the witness list to be called by lawyers for George Tiller in a motion to dismiss misdemeanor charges related to how Tiller performed late-term abortions.
Defense attorney Dan Monnat said in a statement he was confident Six will eventually see that rather than waste taxpayer money, the only proper disposition of the “political prosecution” is dismissal.
Dan Monnat, who represents Tiller, called the request to leave the allegations unanswered “zany” during Thursday’s hearing, drawing an objection from assistant attorney general Barry Disney.
“After the defense has shown its hand, the state wants to renege on its agreement, play by a different set of rules and hide its hand,” Monnat said.
