Ex-Detroit cops: Probe of dancer Tamara Greene’s death hit hurdles
Two former Detroit police officers — a dispatcher and a homicide detective — said in sworn affidavits that police officials tried to cover up investigations into a long-rumored wild party at the mayoral Manoogian Mansion and the slaying of dancer Tamara Greene.
The affidavits were filed Saturday in a federal lawsuit brought by Greene’s family. Greene, who purportedly danced at the party, was killed in a drive-by shooting in April 2003.
The two former cops are the latest in a line of witnesses Birmingham attorney Norman Yatooma, who represents Greene’s family in a lawsuit against the city and police officials, has produced in the case.
However, he has yet to produce anyone who said they attended the party or witnessed a purported assault on a stripper — believed to be Greene — by Carlita Kilpatrick, the wife of former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick.
“They’re both compelling,” Yatooma, who filed the affidavits in support of a Free Press request last month that urged U.S. District Judge Gerald Rosen to unseal the files in the case, said today of the new affidavits.
Repeated investigations in the rumored party have produced no evidence. And Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, who looked into the matter, closed his investigation after meeting with Kilpatrick — without state police investigators present — and dismissed the party as “an urban legend.”
Cox’s spokesman, John Sellek, declined today to comment on the affidavits, but said investigators from his office and the State Police have “interviewed over 200 witnesses and no witness has produced any evidence that could be used in court.”
Former police dispatcher Sandy Cardenas said she was on duty the night several scout cars responded to reports of a disturbance at the Manoogian and that the tapes of the runs were taken the next night.
Former homicide Sgt. Odell Godbold Sr. said his investigation into Greene’s death was stymied by higher ups. Godbold, who said he retired because his career was in jeopardy, said he later found that numerous tips and solid leads into Greene’s killing had been turned over to the police department and never reached investigators working the case.
In his 11-page affidavit, Godbold said his bosses “did everything within … their power to stop, obstruct, hinder, and terminate my investigation into Tamara Greene homicide.”
Cardenas said the dispatcher who worked the shift after hers in October 2002 told her “A Detroit police officer came into the dispatch area and removed all of the 911 tapes of the run. The midnight dispatchers specifically told me that it was an internal affairs officer who took the tapes.”
Cardenas couldn’t be reached for comment today.
In his statement, Godbold said he worked for CrimeStoppers after his retirement and found numerous tips on the Greene case that he had never seen before.
He said he waited to come forward, “only because former Mayor (Kwame) Kilpatrick was still in office and I have two adult children working for the city and I didn’t want to jeopardize their employment.”
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