Markel Hutchins suing Kathryn Johnston estate for nearly $500,000
Atlanta minister says family made verbal agreement to pay him 10 percent of $4.9 million settlement
- Joeff Davis/CL File
- The Rev. Markel Hutchins
The Rev. Markel Hutchins, an Atlanta minister who served as a spokesman for the family of Kathryn Johnston, the 92-year-old woman who was killed by Atlanta Police during a botched drug raid in 2006, is now suing her estate for allegedly failing to pay him for his services.
The community activist and former congressional candidate claims he made a verbal agreement with Johnston’s family that he’d receive 10 percent of the $4.9 million settlement from the city for his work. According to a statement on Hutchins’ Facebook page:
“In the aftermath of the tragic death of Mrs. Kathryn Johnston and specifically at the request of her estate’s administrator Mrs. Sarah Dozier and her attorneys at The Cochran Firm, from the very evening that Mrs. Johnston was killed until the very day the lawsuit against the City of Atlanta settled, I served as the family and Estate’s spokesperson, strategist, advisor and consultant with a clear understanding of how I would be compensated. My staff and I holistically managed the public and private efforts that made the significant settlement possible and yielded Mrs. Johnston’s heirs millions of dollars. I literally risked my own safety and security to advance the cause of the Estate of Kathryn Johnston and expended considerable resources of my own with no reimbursement or remuneration to date. For the past 7 years my professional consulting firm has provided various clients with expert services in several areas. In this case, I was not merely an interested activist - I was an engaged consultant. The Johnston family, the Cochran Firm and I enjoyed a valued, trusted and mutually respectful relationship yet, I’ve not heard from either since they got the money despite my every diligent, diplomatic effort to resolve this matter privately. I lived up to my personal and contractual commitment to them and they must do likewise. I have entrusted my attorneys to pursue fairness, justice and equity for me as aggressively as I pursued those things for the late Mrs. Johnston and her estate.”
The minister told WAOK’s Lorraine Jacques-White this morning:
“I had an expressed agreement. I could not in good conscious put a contract in their face,” stated Hutchins, “But when you go to work for someone, and you perform a task, and you do it in excellence, you are obligated to pay them!”
You can hear his entire interview here.