Carson’s wife says she, daughter were wronged. Now, they want county, cities to pay.

Modesto attorney Frank Carson’s wife, Georgia DeFilippo, and her daughter, Christina DeFilippo, claim they were wrongfully prosecuted in a “witch hunt” by the Stanislaus County District Attorney’s Office.

The mother and daughter were once accused in an alleged murder conspiracy in the death of Turlock resident Korey Kauffman. The DeFilippos have since been cleared of any wrongdoing. And this week they filed claims with Stanislaus County and the cities of Modesto and Turlock, seeking damages for what they call a malicious prosecution.

“My reputation and my daughter’s reputation was shattered in the newspapers, on television and over the Internet,” Georgia DeFilippo said Wednesday in a news conference outside the Stanislaus Superior Courthouse. “Over the last two years, I’ve drained my financial resources and spent my retirement savings defending myself and my daughter in an incident my family had no part of.”

Stanislaus County District Attorney Birgit Fladager on Wednesday declined to respond to the DeFilippos’ claims, referring questions on this issue to the County Counsel John Doering. He declined to comment at this early stage of the claim’s review process.

He said the DeFilippos’ claim will be placed on the board’s Oct. 17 meeting agenda. The board then will likely send the claim to the county’s risk management department, which has 45 days from the filing date to review the claim, Doering said. If rejected or no action is taken by then, the plaintiffs can then file a civil lawsuit.

Judge Barbara Zuniga in April said there was no evidence the DeFillipos were involved in an alleged conspiracy surrounding Kauffman’s death, even with the low standard of proof in a preliminary hearing.

“Thank God the judge vindicated (the DeFillipos), and we intend to follow up with that vindication,” said attorney Gary Gwilliam. His Oakland-based law firm filed the claims on behalf of the DeFillipos.

But the judge determined there was sufficient evidence to order Carson to stand trial along with co-defendant brothers Baljit Athwal and Daljit Atwal.

The brothers are owners of a Turlock convenience store, and they’re accused of confronting Kauffman on Carson’s Turlock property before Kauffman was shot. The three defendants are accused of murder, and their trial is scheduled to start Jan. 8.

The DeFilippos’ claims were submitted Tuesday. They claim county, Modesto and Turlock officials are responsible for defamation, violations of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress, false arrest, false imprisonment, federal civil rights violations and state civil rights violations associated with false murder and accessory to murder charges filed against them.

Local governments typically have 45 days to respond to filed claims seeking damages. Gwilliam said he expects the claims to be denied. He said they will then file a lawsuit against the county, Modesto and Turlock in Stanislaus Superior Court.

Gwilliam’s firm said Georgia DeFilippo spent $390,000 in bail money, about $500,000 in attorneys’ fees and nearly $88,000 in court costs. Gwilliam said his firm has not yet specified how much more money they would seek for his clients’ emotional distress.

Christina DeFilippo was not able to attend Wednesday’s news conference, so Gwilliam spoke on her behalf.

Carson, his wife and his stepdaughter were arrested Aug. 14, 2015. His stepdaughter was released on bail soon after. His wife remained in custody at the county jail until late September 2015, after Judge Zuniga reduced her bail amount from $10 million to $4.5 million. The attorney’s wife had been charged with murder. They were both charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice and accused of being an accessory in the crime.

In the claims, the plaintiffs list as defendants members of a countywide law enforcement task force investigating Kauffman’s disappearance and death. The DeFilippos claim the defendants conspired to prosecute Carson and his family solely based on their disdain for Carson’s successes against them as a criminal defense attorney.

Georgia DeFilippo on Wednesday stood less than a block away from the District Attorney’s Office in downtown Modesto, telling a group of reporters that prosecutors produced a convoluted, incomprehensible 18-month preliminary hearing that ended with her and her daughter’s exoneration.

“We are completely and entirely innocent of the felonies we were charged with, and the prosecution knew it,” she said. “If this can happen to me, it can happen to anyone.”

This story was originally published October 4, 2017 at 4:11 PM with the headline "Carson’s wife says she, daughter were wronged. Now, they want county, cities to pay.."