Court records obtained by media outlets show that the district attorney of Fulton County, Fani Willis, paid her purported lover, Nathan Wade, more per hour to work on the case involving former president Donald Trump than she did to hire the top racketeer in the state.
A contract states that on March 10, 2021, the Fulton County District Attorney’s office contracted with John Floyd, a renowned expert in state and federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statutes, for $150 per hour. Court papers show that Willis paid special prosecutor Nathan Wade $250 per hour. However, Willis said recently that all of her special counsels were paid the same amount.
One of Trump’s co-defendants asked for dismissal of the case because Willis had a financial interest in granting Wade, who was supposedly her lover, a lucrative contract so that he could use the money from his job to treat her to trips and cruises. The day after Wade started working for Willis, on November 2, 2021, he filed for a divorce from his wife.
Willis addressed the claims for the first time during her speech at Big Bethel AME Church. She said that in the Trump case, she paid the same hourly rate to all three special counsels and that one of them—with an oblique reference to Wade—was being targeted only because of his race. She said she hired them and gave them all the same hourly wage.
Willis said that Black women cannot be expected to be flawless saviors.
The received contract only goes until April 2022, so Floyd was likely paid more after the fact.
A report shows that Ashleigh Merchant, Roman’s attorney, asserts that Wade has never been a prosecutor in a criminal trial, including a RICO case.
A case involving manipulated standardized test results led to the guilty verdict of eleven Atlanta school teachers in 2015. According to a report, more than 30 Atlanta public school teachers were subject to RICO charges after Floyd and Willis collaborated to persecute them.
After presiding over traffic ticket cases as a municipal judge and trial counsel, Wade moved on to family law cases.
Since 2022, Wade has been paid more than $654,000 in fees.
Fani Willis started the probe investigating Donald Trump in February 2021.
