KANSAS CITY, Kan. (WDAF) — A retired Kansas City, Kansas, police detective facing explosive federal charges was hospitalized on Tuesday, according to court documents.
Seventy-year-old Roger Golubski has also been freed from certain conditions of his release. He will not be required to wear his GPS-tracking ankle monitor as he receives medical treatment, court records say.
Details of the health issue have not been disclosed. An attorney for Golubski could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
In earlier court appearances, attorneys explained that Golubski needed dialysis and had other health issues, contributing factors that led to a judge granting him house arrest.
But nothing about the situation has been reassuring to the people who call themselves his victims.
Ophelia Williams-Pettway said her health is also worsening as she waits for Golubski’s trial. She said her run-in with the former KCK detective happened in 2000.
“When they took my sons and then came back and raped me, you know … I was like, ‘Man, it’s nothing I can do,'” Williams-Pettway said.
“I don’t even look at him that long, you know? He just still look the same to me: a dirty old b*****d,” Williams-Pettway said about seeing Golubski in court.
Golubski now faces federal charges, including alleged abuses of power going back decades, like conspiring to run a sex-trafficking operation involving underage girls.
He previously pleaded not guilty to the charges against him.
The charges follow a $12.5 million settlement in a civil case where Lamonte McIntyre’s attorneys argued Golubski was a key figure in his wrongful conviction. McIntyre spent 23 years in prison before he was cleared and released.
“For as long as the Department of Justice has been in this case, they’ve known it’s going to be a race with the grim reaper to bring this guy to justice,” said Sean O’Brien, a UMKC law professor.
O’Brien said he has represented some of Golubski’s reported victims who say they’re disturbed by the change to the conditions of his release and the situation in general.
“This is a classic case of ‘Justice delayed is justice denied,'” O’Brien said. “I mean, this is a fellow who used his position as a police officer … to say ‘take advantage’ of citizens is a gross understatement. He raped women.”
Williams-Pettway frames the situation differently.
“I’ve got congestive heart failure. I can go any time,” she said.
“I don’t think God would let him go like that. I don’t think the devil would either,” she said.
FOX4 sent messages to Golubski’s attorney for more details on this health situation and how serious it is.
