Finally, some justice for Lamonte McIntyre. Now keep the money vultures away from him

Lamonte McIntyre will never get back those 23 years. Arrested at 17, he turned into an adult languishing in a prison cell for a double homicide he didn’t commit. When he was finally exonerated and freed in 2017 at age 41, he found himself thrust into a world that left him anxious and frustrated, argumentative and chronically sleep-deprived. “Every day, I wake up and feel like I’m missing something,” he said in 2019.

So we hope the $12.5 million settlement the Unified Government of Wyandotte County board of commissioners approved Thursday night will go at least a little way toward filling that void. But while it’s encouraging to know McIntyre will have more than his barbering skills to sustain him financially, money won’t erase the scars that decades of wrongful imprisonment left on his psyche and his soul.

Those dollars also won’t stanch the deep vein of corruption running through the Kansas City, Kansas Police Department that sentenced McIntyre to prison in the first place. He and his mother Rosie allege KCK detective Roger Golbski sexually assaulted her, and then demanded she submit further to ongoing abuse. When she refused, the McIntyres say Golubski framed Lamonte for the 1994 murders of Doniel Quinn and Donald Ewing in retaliation. Golubski, now retired, is still walking around a free man, though a cloud of credible stories just like Rosie’s from multiple other women follows him.

Wyandotte County taxpayers are going to discover the rot at police headquarters has a hefty price tag. A county financial report recently warned that having to pay McIntyre restitution “could have a material adverse effect on the financial position and operations of the Unified Government.” That might mean borrowing via bonds, or raising fees and taxes to cover a budget shortfall. But WyCo’s worries take a back seat to McIntyre’s.

Obviously, $12.5 million is a tremendous lot of money, and the IRS rightly no longer taxes restitution for wrongful convictions. If he’s savvy, he should be able to use it to settle into a comfortable life.

Still, he’ll almost certainly find himself besieged by people hoping they can snag a little of his nest egg. A member of The Star Editorial Board had a neighbor who’d hit a $2 million lotto jackpot. One day, a face he didn’t recognize showed up on his doorstep. My locker was next to yours in seventh grade, the man said. If only you’d let me have $15,000, it would change my life. Giving a little away to everyone who pitches McIntyre a sob story could chip away at his fortune faster than he realizes.

The outright scammers will target him, too — though a lifetime of injustice has no doubt made him constitutionally wary. Surely he’ll be skeptical of the moochers and too-good-to-be-true investment opportunities heading his way soon.

We’re confident McIntyre will take it slow and find himself a trusted financial adviser. Stories of people who go bankrupt just years after coming into a big windfall like a lottery win or big inheritance are anything but rare. Splurge a little at first, sure — but remember there’s a long game to play.

Lamonte McIntyre has been through tribulations few among us can begin to imagine. And this is only the beginning of righting the injustice that stole the better part of his life. But now that he’s at long last caught a well-deserved break, he deserves at least to turn it into an enduring comfort.

This story was originally published July 1, 2022 at 5:00 AM.