More money woes rock Wilkerson
Must pay $13,335 in back condo fees
By Donovan Slack, Globe Staff | September 26, 2006
Dianne Wilkerson, the veteran Roxbury senator whose tangled personal finances have become a public spectacle over the years, has more money troubles coming to light, this time for failing to pay condo fees on her Douglass Park home.
A Roxbury District Court judge, Michael Bolden, said yesterday that Wilkerson owes $13,335 to the Douglass Park Condominium Association and ordered her to pay it. Records in the case show the senator bounced more than $5,000 worth of checks in the past three years and has not submitted any of the required $466 monthly payments since September.
The ruling is the latest glimpse of Wilkerson's tumultuous personal finances, which include federal tax charges and threats of foreclosure for failing to make mortgage payments. The attorney general's office is investigating campaign donations and expenses related to a reelection effort.
It is also coming to light less than a week after she was declared the winner in a hard-fought campaign for the Democratic nomination to her Second Suffolk District seat. The race is being contested by her chief rival in the primary, Sonia Chang-Díaz, who has gathered enough signatures to force a recount.
The lawsuit was filed by the condominium association in March, but the case apparently languished for several months in Bolden's office as the campaign for Wilkerson's seat was waged.
Rather than making a ruling on the case after a June 27th hearing, in which Wilkerson did not appear or make a defense, Bolden took the case under advisement and kept the case file in his chambers. Until yesterday's decision, it was unavailable at the clerk's office.
The condo association's lawyer, Michael Pavloski, said it was odd that the judge did not decide in the association's favor immediately.
``When somebody defaults and doesn't show up, it usually happens in the courtroom," he said.
By the time of the June hearing, Wilkerson had declared she would run as a write-in candidate after failing to gather enough signatures before a May 2 deadline to be put on the primary ballot. On June 18, Chang-Díaz announced she would wage a sticker campaign to unseat Wilkerson.
Yesterday's ruling was perfunctory. Bolden said Wilkerson should pay ``after a hearing, review of the pleadings, and no opposition by the defendant."
Judge Edward R. Redd, the presiding justice of Roxbury District Court, said yesterday that a ruling on the case was delayed simply because the court has been overwhelmed with work and had nothing to do with the election.
``The only difficulty was it was in one of my judges' chambers," Redd said. ``Each judge works at a different pace."
A spokeswoman for Judge Charles Johnson, chief justice in the Boston Municipal Court system, said the judge could not immediately respond to questions about the delay.
Wilkerson's condo association has repeatedly sued the senator for nonpayment of the monthly condominium fees, according to court records. In April 2002, Wilkerson signed an agreement to pay, but soon fell behind again.
After she failed to pay fees from September 2002 through January 2003, the association sued for $2,500 in small claims court, Roxbury Division, saying, ``Plaintiff can see a pattern in defendant, and plaintiff would like to avoid using a lawyer."
The claim was dismissed in June 2003 when Wilkerson brought her account up to date. Over the next year, though, checks from Wilkerson totaling $5,174 were returned because of insufficient funds, court filings show.
Wilkerson purchased the 1,537-square-foot Douglass Park condo in 1993. The complex of four- and six-story red-brick buildings has a fitness center, landscaped courtyard, and 24-hour concierge service near the corner of Columbus and Massachusetts avenues in Roxbury.
The senator yesterday said she has moved out of the condo, is renting it out, and has embarked on a restructuring of her personal finances. ``I have done some pretty extraordinary things around a total reorganization of my personal financial situation," Wilkerson said. ``I'm really excited."
She said she disputes about $4,000 of the judgment and hopes to negotiate the debt.
Donovan Slack can be reached at
[email protected].
© Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.
