Ex-dispatcher: I sent cops to 02′ Manoogian disturbance
Detroit — A former Detroit police officer and 911 dispatcher says she dispatched police to a disturbance at the Manoogian Mansion in the fall of 2002.
Officers couldn’t get entry to the mayor’s mansion because the doors were locked, so they picked up Carlita Kilpatrick, the wife of then-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, and brought her to the mansion, says a sworn affidavit from former Detroit police dispatcher Sandy Cardenas.
“Detroit police officers, one of whom was a sergeant, told me that once Carlita got inside the mansion, the disturbance heated up immediately and an assault took place,” Cardenas said in the affidavit.
The next night, Cardenas said she learned from other dispatchers that a Detroit police officer from internal affairs came to the dispatch center and removed all of the 911 tapes of the run.
A sworn affidavit from Cardenas is among new documents filed in a lawsuit brought against the city of Detroit by the family of slain exotic dancer Tamara “Strawberry” Greene.
Greene, a dancer who was linked to a rumored stripper party at the Manoogian Mansion in the fall of 2002, was shot to death in Detroit on April 30, 2003.
Her family is suing the city, former Mayor Kilpatrick, and top city and police officials, alleging they obstructed the investigation into Greene’s still-unsolved killing for political reasons. The defendants deny the allegations.
Norman Yatooma, the lawyer for Greene’s family, said in a weekend court filing he supports greater openness and fewer seals in the case, partly because publicity from the case continues to generate new tips on what happened to Greene.
“This case, which deals with defendants’ cover-up and destruction of the investigation into the death of Tamara Greene, which investigation would have revealed significant corruption and wrongdoing on the part of the defendants and other high-profile public figures, is certainly a matter of genuine public interest,” Yatooma said in a court filing.
The Cardenas affidavit and other records were included in the Yatooma court filing, which was not sealed as many filings in the case have been.
Cardenas said she believes the Manoogian incident was in October, but she does not cite a specific date.
She said she recalls talking to Detroit Police Sgt. Shawn Garalino, who she said was the supervising officer in charge of the Manoogian scene. Garalino could not immediately be reached for comment.
Police picked up Carlita Kilpatrick from the Kilpatrick’s private home on Leslie Street and brought her to the mansion, which at the time was still being prepared for the Kilpatricks to move in, the affidavit said.
A lawyer for The Detroit News has asked the judge hearing the lawsuit to give more public access to the case.
“My clients are particularly concerned with what appears to be the efforts by the parties to increasingly attempt to conduct the case away from public scrutiny,” attorney James E. Stewart of Butzel Long, writing on behalf of The Detroit News and WXYZ-TV, said in a letter to Chief U.S. District Judge Gerald E. Rosen.
Rosen is considering a motion from the Detroit Free Press to unseal certain filings in the lawsuit. The judge has cited the need to protect an ongoing investigation into Greene’s killing and concerns about privacy rights as reasons for the unusual level of secrecy in the civil lawsuit.
But Mayer Morganroth, an attorney for defendant Christine Beatty, Kilpatrick’s former chief of staff, said sealing certain records in the case and imposing a partial gag order will help assure an impartial jury can be selected when the case goes to trial.
“It is entirely within this court’s discretion to seal certain filings which relate to an active and ongoing homicide investigation, which could reveal private and confidential information of non-parties and which could prejudice the jury pool,” Morganroth said in a court filing.
