Inside the tangled allegations, relationships in FBI’s Kansas City probe
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Grand jury subpoena sought city records about Anton Washington
- Emails detailed alleged inappropriate conduct as city kept contracting Washington
- Probe examines contract ties and possible favoritism from 2021–2024
As Kansas City grapples with fallout from a federal criminal investigation, a grand jury subpoena released this month has thrust into the spotlight a local nonprofit leader who worked with the city to combat homelessness.
Behind the scenes, City Hall’s yearslong relationship with that leader — Anton Washington — has been plagued by allegations of inappropriate behavior leveled at Washington, according to two emails obtained by The Star.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation obtained a copy of one of those emails as part of a sweeping probe that has upended Kansas City politics, according to a source and copies of communications reviewed by The Star. But the full extent of the investigation, and its exact target, remains unclear.
The federal subpoena, sent to City Hall in August, sought a series of government records, including awarded contracts, payments and communications between city officials and Washington, the head of Creative Innovative, a nonprofit designed to connect the city’s homeless population with resources.
City Hall’s financial relationship with Washington dates back to at least 2021, when the city contracted with his organization to assist people experiencing homelessness. As city leaders doled out contracts to Washington, emails detailing allegations against the nonprofit leader followed, according to the emails and two sources who spoke with The Star.
Washington, who has also gone by the name Martinus Sayles, did not return several calls for comment over multiple days for this story. The Star visited an address listed for Washington on Monday, but no one answered the door. A reporter left a note on the door with contact information.
Washington previously confirmed to The Star that he had been interviewed by the FBI. In a phone call with a reporter earlier this month, he broadly denied any wrongdoing tied to the subpoena.
The allegations against Washington detailed in the emails, which include an incident that one service provider described as abusive, do not appear to illustrate criminal behavior and he has not been charged with any crimes related to the investigation.
It’s unclear why the FBI would show interest in the allegations and the documents tied to his organization — whether it’s to scrutinize why the city continued working with him, to investigate the contracts the city provided to him or for another reason.
One reason could be that investigators are taking a look at improper or favorable treatment by city officials to Washington, said Pat McInerney, a prominent Kansas City attorney who was previously an assistant U.S. attorney for the Western District of Missouri.
The existence of the federal subpoena and revelations about a series of FBI interviews illustrate that the investigation could be far along, said McInerney, who is not involved with the probe and spoke with The Star as a legal expert.
“The investigation, based on the timeline, appears to be fairly mature,” he said. “There’s nothing covert about it. They’re interviewing witnesses. They’re asking wide open questions. They’re collecting documents.”
A spokesperson for the FBI’s Kansas City office said he could neither confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation, citing the federal agency’s longstanding policy not to comment on potential investigations.
One source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, was interviewed by two FBI agents last July at the agency’s office near Kansas City International Airport. The source, who did temporary work with Washington, said the agents asked about the city’s contracts with Washington’s organization.
But one focus of the interview centered on a July 5, 2022, email the source sent to Kansas City council member Ryana Parks-Shaw, now a top-ranking elected official running for mayor who has ties to Washington; Josh Henges, the city’s homeless prevention coordinator; Marqueia Watson, then-executive director of the Greater Kansas City Coalition to End Homelessness; and another temporary worker.
The email, obtained by The Star, served as a follow-up to a “report of abuse” that a client who was experiencing homelessness made to the source regarding Washington. The email did not specify the extent of the alleged abuse, but referenced “highly inappropriate and unprofessional” Facebook Messenger messages between Washington and the client.
“I have (the client’s) permission to share these messages with anyone who would need to be involved to ensure that this does not happen in the future and to ensure that Anton is no longer in a position to perpetuate such abuse,” the email said. “What he reported that was said to him in person inside Anton’s apartment would be, by any account to be abusive in nature.”
The email raised concerns that the client — who had two young children — would not be able to access shelter, housing and other resources in a timely manner after reporting the allegations.
The email also expressed fear that the allegations had not been addressed with Washington; that Washington could “continue to seek contact with that client that could be of an inappropriate nature;” and that Washington “may also have inappropriate contact with other clients.”
In an interview with The Star, the source said the two FBI agents were interested in speaking with the client who reported the allegation, but they were not able to get in contact. The Star was also unable to get in contact with the client.
When The Star inquired about a line in the email that referenced comments Washington made inside his apartment, the source relayed to a reporter what the client allegedly said about that interaction.
According to the source, Washington told the client that he could stay at his apartment.
When the client asked where he would sleep, Washington responded, “in my bed, of course,” according to the source.
The Star also reviewed screenshots of the alleged Facebook messages referenced in the email. Those screenshots were provided to the FBI in January, the source said. The messages appeared to be exchanges between Washington and the client, referencing Washington’s attempts to find a job and food stamps for the client.
However, the screenshots also show several times when Washington sent messages late at night that the client did not respond to. In one instance, Washington sent “Wyd” — shorthand for “What are you doing?” — at 12:54 a.m. In another, he sent “Wyd,” followed by “Hello,” at 11:30 p.m.
The source told The Star that the late night messages and Washington’s alleged comment inside his apartment made the client uncomfortable. Washington’s use of Facebook also marked a departure from how service providers typically communicate with clients and the nature of the messages would likely have resulted in termination for other providers, the source said.
It’s unclear what steps, if any, city officials took to investigate the allegation. A spokesperson for the city did not respond to a series of questions for this story.
But records obtained by The Star show that the city kept working with, and continued providing money to, Washington’s organization through at least 2024.
When asked about the city’s ties with Washington, Megan Strickland, a spokesperson for Mayor Quinton Lucas, said Washington has worked “in and around the homeless services space in Kansas City since at least 2020, appearing frequently at City Hall and contacting staff and elected officials,” and “received a special action honor in 2023.”
Washington has touted his work on a city task force, spearheaded by Lucas, that was designed to confront the growing problem of homelessness in Kansas City. When asked about that, Strickland said the mayor solicits recommendations for boards and Washington came “recommended, given his involvement with homelessness prevention and outreach.”
City Council members, Strickland said, “spent millions and passed numerous iterations of homelessness prevention and outreach boards.”
“The Mayor would refer all questions about investigations to the Office of the City Auditor and federal authorities,” said Strickland.
Inside KC’s contracts
At the time of the 2022 email, Kansas City had two active contracts with Washington’s organization: a $49,440 contract for homeless outreach assistance services and a freshly signed $35,000 contract to clean up trash, tires and appliances scattered across the city.
In the months and years that followed, City Hall continued contracting with Washington, according to records Kansas City provided to The Star in response to a records request.
All told, from 2021 through 2024, city officials signed into seven contracts — and one contract amendment — with Washington’s organization, totaling roughly $287,000. Financial records obtained by The Star, however, show the organization received additional funding in 2025, a discrepancy that makes it unclear whether the city is still working with his organization.
The contracts spell out various services across the city, including trash cleanups and assisting the city’s homeless population with finding housing and resources. Washington’s work involved three city departments: the Housing & Community Development Department, the Neighborhood Services Department and the Public Works Department.
The majority of the agreements — six — were signed by Michael Shaw, the city’s public works director, who is married to Parks-Shaw, the council member who was alerted to the 2022 allegation. The final agreement included in the records obtained by The Star, a February 2024 litter abatement contract, expired on April 30, 2024.
And then, roughly three months after that contract expired, another allegation involving Washington surfaced inside City Hall.
Another allegation
On Aug. 8, 2024, a homeless outreach worker with the city forwarded his supervisors in the city’s Office of Unhoused Solutions what he called a “concerning email.”
“Although this isn’t the first time a client has come (to) me regarding concerning behavior from this individual,” the worker wrote in the email, “this is the first time a client wanted to voice those concerns publicly. I expressed that I would pass this information along to my supervisors for further guidance.”
The attached email, obtained by The Star, came from a man named Sean Marshall. Marshall wrote in the email that he had been “inappropriately addressed” by Washington sometime around October 2023.
Marshall wrote that Washington had previously provided him with marijuana and money, which he initially thought was a kind gesture. But Marshall said he later believed Washington “was grooming me for a romantic relationship.”
The email described a time when Washington picked Marshall up for a job. Washington, according to the email, told Marshall that he “looked handsome” and “sexy.” Marshall wrote that he became combative in response and felt uncomfortable because Washington was his supervisor.
At that point, the email said, Washington made Marshall get out of the car and told him he “no longer had a place on his Roster.” Marshall wrote that he was no longer employed because Washington “approached me inappropriately.”
“I wanted to give you this information so you are aware so this does not happen to others,” Marshall wrote in the email.
The city employee who forwarded the email, reached by phone by The Star, declined to comment on the situation.
Court records show that Marshall has a criminal history in Kansas and Missouri and was charged in 2024 with the death of a 17-year-old in Wyandotte County. Attempts to reach Marshall through one of his attorneys were unsuccessful.
Inside the investigation
The subpoena and allegations against Washington mark another revelation related to a federal investigation that has roiled City Hall over the past year.
Throughout the last month, The Star spoke with three former city employees who were interviewed by the FBI last year. Those employees, who spoke on condition of anonymity, described being asked a range of questions about government contracts and campaign donations.
One focus of the questions centered on Parks-Shaw, the mayor pro tem, and her husband, the public works director, the sources said. That element of the investigation was the basis of a recent TV report, which tied the federal inquiry to whether the couple used their authority for financial and professional gain.
But the sources who spoke with The Star also detailed a host of other questions from the FBI, indicating that the exact focus of the investigation was still unclear.
McInerney, the former federal prosecutor, said that individuals who are contacted by federal investigators typically fall into three categories: target, subject and witness. If a person is considered a target, that means their conduct is the focus of the investigation.
If an individual is a subject, that means their conduct has “come within the scope” of the investigation. And witnesses are people who may have relevant information related to the investigation, he said.
In public corruption investigations, for example, it can be hard to determine the direction of a probe based on a single grand jury subpoena, McInerney said. Investigators, he said, typically cast a wide net.
“They really kind of cover the gamut,” McInerney said. “They cover a whole lot of turf.”
Those types of investigations can include bribery, wire fraud, mail fraud and bank fraud, he said. There are also additional, more specific, types of investigations.
“In prior investigations that have touched City Hall in Kansas City, investigators have taken a hard look at contract relationships between external contractors and elected officials or elected officials’ families or even appointed officials,” he said. “They’ve scrutinized those for whether there was influence that was exerted by the city officials … or if there was some sort of quid pro quo.”
McInerney acknowledged that there have been months-and years-long federal investigations that have not resulted in charges. But he cautioned that those situations are rare.
“If investigators and prosecutors are being responsible, then they’re looking at the investigation through the lens of the final product and whether they ultimately can take the material and the investigation results and take it to court and prove it,” he said. “That’s the lens through which prosecutors look at these things — or should — and it takes a lot to get there.”
‘A champion for’ Ryana Parks-Shaw
Speculation about the probe ramped up after the release of the grand jury subpoena earlier this month. In the wake of that release, Kansas City’s mayor went on a local radio show and suggested he did not see a tie between the investigation and Parks-Shaw.
Lucas added that he would not “destroy the reputations of people who have spent decades building it.”
“If there’s something there, then cool, I’m going to show up on your show. I’m going to answer questions about it. You’re going to professionally ask me about it,” Lucas said. “But we’re not about to just sit here and just say, ‘oh yeah, these people got a whole bunch of challenges.’ When, frankly, from every official thing I’ve seen so far, I’m not seeing the connection.”
While the exact focus of the FBI probe remains unclear, Washington, the nonprofit leader, has several ties to Parks-Shaw.
Campaign finance records reviewed by The Star show that Washington has donated $203 to Parks-Shaw from 2024 to 2025, a small figure for a campaign committee that currently has roughly $101,000 in cash on hand.
Over several days, Parks-Shaw did not return three calls and an email seeking comment for this story.
Throughout the past decade, Washington has only contributed to the campaigns for Parks-Shaw and Jackson County Prosecutor Melesa Johnson, campaign finance records show.
In recent weeks, Washington has taken to social media to express support for Parks-Shaw amid reports about the ongoing investigation.
“I also want to make one thing absolutely clear: I stand with Ryana for KC,” Washington wrote in a lengthy Facebook post last month. “We will not tolerate the Attempts to slander, isolate, or misrepresent her with lies… She is someone who has consistently shown integrity and commitment to this community.”
Washington has a criminal history, including a 2012 guilty plea for his role in an alleged check fraud conspiracy with his twin brother. In September, roughly a month after Kansas City received the federal subpoena for records related to Washington, the nonprofit leader filed petitions in both state and federal courts to have his criminal records expunged.
Attached to the filings, Washington included letters that detailed how he had rehabilitated himself. In the letters, he highlighted his work in the community, including his affiliation with Parks-Shaw.
“Serving as a champion for Mayoral candidate Ryana Parks-Shaw and continuing to work toward systemic community-driven change,” the court filing said.
A federal judge denied the request, finding that Washington failed to state which convictions he wanted to expunge and which laws allowed the court to expunge them. A local judge dismissed the case in January, finding that Washington had not paid a filing fee.
The Star’s Ben Wheeler and Eric Adler contributed reporting.
