he's a secret witness talking to the FBI
about Detroit's demolition scandal and
tonight for the first time he's
revealing himself and sharing his story
with the defenders efforts to demolish
vacant and blighted Detroit homes have
run rampant with massive costs overruns
and accusations of big rig bid-rigging
well now for the first time ever a
contractor cooperating with the feds is
speaking out only to the defenders we
bring in Kevin Dietz who's live with
more on a wide-ranging investigation
involving millions of spent tax dollars
Kevin yes this is a full-scale federal
investigation the FBI is looking at city
officials who are running the demolition
program we're talking grand juries we're
talking subpoenas and we're talking a
lot of witnesses and now for the first
time one of those witnesses is speaking
out demolition is a dirty business and
we're not just talking about the mess
from knocking down houses meet Tim Drake
Furth the witness he is doing something
you rarely see on TV talking about being
interviewed by the FBI in the massive
federal investigation into Detroit's
demolition program the federal
delegation is always dressed because you
don't know who's turning the corner
who's looking at you who's coming
aiyoo who's watching you on a job the
feds have been to direct construction
not once not twice but three times and
Tim Drake firt says when the feds want
answers you give them you're not hiding
anything from know if they want to come
in here and get anything they more than
welcome Drake first attorney says he's
not a target he's a cooperating witness
helping the feds with information that
could lead to charges against city
officials I was fully cooperated with
everything you know whatever they asked
I gave it to him fully cooperating Drake
FERC turned over records I'm bidding
pricing and shared what he knows about
who is getting the work and how he says
the big firms have been getting the
contracts leaving the little guys to get
hired as subcontractors with little
profit he says many were muscled out as
contracts became more convoluted ten
years ago
about 20 or 30 small big everybody had
their niche it went just six or five
contractors its the profits of the big
three demo companies that is at the
heart of the FBI investigation the
defenders obtaining numerous documents
indicating bid rigging in price-fixing
in February 2016 Michigan was in line
for three hundred million federal
hardest hit fund dollars in Detroit
houses were coming down in record
numbers but the cost jumped from eleven
thousand five hundred per property in
2014 to eighteen thousand dollars in
2016
creating millions of dollars in over
billing I'm praying to God it does come
get clean and get back to normal because
there's a lot of people hurting within
90 days the feds thought something was
fishy subpoenas rolled in demanding
financial records and emails from the
Detroit Building Authority Land Bank
State Housing Development
the blight elimination team as well as
the mayor's office and the contractors
got most of the early work now the feds
are dug in in Detroit grilling
cooperating witnesses like Tim Drake
Byrd whatever you do in the dark
Michelle come to the light and that's
what's happening it's all coming for
wishing forward turn
we talked to John Roach at the mayor's
office today and he says the city is
cooperating fully with the FBI here's
how he characterizes this investigation
he says there were some disputes in
billing and that the city agreed to pay
back seven million dollars and correct
the procedures that were wrong in the
demolition program he says the system
the program is working fine now and he
says in fact the federal government has
now released another 100 million dollars
for demolition in the city of Detroit
because they have confidence in the way
the program is being run now davon
kimberly kevin interesting though when
you look back at that first small
trigger that launched this full FBI
investigation yeah here's what really
triggered it here it's an audit that was
done in 2016 the state did the audit
taxpayers paid two and a half million
dollars for it the state was so worried
they turned it over the FBI immediately
contacted the city immediately but what
they did not do is release it publicly
tonight at 11:00 we're going to dig into
this audit and we're going to find out
why the state went to court to keep this
audit a secret for so long all right
Kevin we'll see you tonight at eleven