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NEWS & LETTERS, JULY 2003
Detroit corruption reaches the top
Detroit--The corruption, criminal activity and coverups
of wrongdoing were so widespread in the Detroit Police Department that the
people, including City Council members, called for a federal investigation into
the department about a year ago. This month the federal investigators submitted
a report that, among other things, called for the indictment of 17 police
officers assigned to southwest Detroit on charges of shaking down precinct
prostitutes and drug dealers, theft of huge sums of money and drugs from drug
dealers, systematic coverup of officer abuses and criminal activity, including
the planting of evidence, making false arrests and giving false testimony in
court. The disclosure of this police reign of terror in
southwest Detroit gives rise to questions about the entire police department,
and confirms what many Detroiters know about police abuse in their own areas. A
comment heard everywhere on the streets was that southwest Detroit was no
different from any other precinct--except the southwest precinct wasn’t as
good as other precincts in covering up their abuses. These exposes came on the heels of another scandal
involving Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, his personal security guard and a
high-ranking deputy police officer. The mayor fired the deputy, who was
investigating rumors of a wild party at the mayor’s mansion, and the coverup
of an accident by one of his security guards. The mayor had replaced the old
security guard with cronies from his high school and football playing days,
despite the fact that major security officers in the affair had police records.
He held a widely-publicized press interview in front of his mansion to deny
everything, declaring that nothing in the charges had happened. The deputy who was summarily discharged said he was
fired because he was conducting the investigation involving the mayor, which the
mayor and police chief both denied, although many veteran police officers said
that they could never remember such a high-ranking officer being fired like
that. The mayor and police chief claimed the deputy had simply been reassigned
to another duty, claims that were patently false. Subsequent investigations have resulted in the
resignations of the security officers charged with wrongdoing. The latest news
is that police officers had taken Queen Latifah to an after-hours joint to
“show her a good time,” providing a police escort and companionship. The
only problem with this is that it is all illegal--officers are supposed to shut
down such joints, not frequent them with celebrities. The Michigan state attorney general, who had been called
in to conduct an investigation into the allegations made against Kilpatrick and
his security guards, cleared them of any wrongdoing, but nobody believed him.
All politics, everybody said. One thing is perfectly clear: this is not over, and it
is going to be expensive for Detroit. Paying for the monitor and the reforms
will require money the city can ill afford. And this says nothing about the
lawsuits that will follow on the heels of the indictments of the l7 officers in
southwest Detroit involving previous purjured testimony and false imprisonment. --Andy Phillips |
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