Lawyer: Charges boost stripper case
Indictment supports idea that mayor stalled efforts to find her killer, family’s attorney says.
The lawyer representing the family of slain exotic dancer Tamara Greene says Monday’s criminal charges against Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and his former chief of staff bolster the credibility of his case.
Norman Yatooma said it is significant that obstruction of justice charges against Kilpatrick and Christine Beatty relate to allegations that they fired former Deputy Police Chief Gary Brown to hamper Brown’s criminal investigations related to the mayor and his police bodyguards. Among the allegations Brown was looking into was a rumored party with strippers at the Manoogian Mansion, the mayor’s official residence.
“Terminating Gary Brown was done in order to avoid the investigation of the party,” and Monday’s charges show Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy holds a similar view, Yatooma said.
Greene, an exotic dancer linked to a rumored party at the mayor’s mansion, was shot to death in a drive-by shooting in Detroit on April 30, 2003.
Yatooma represents the father of Greene’s 14-year-old son. The family is suing in U.S. District Court, alleging the investigation of Greene’s killing was hampered for political reasons.
City officials have denied the allegations.
U.S. District Judge Gerald E. Rosen, the judge hearing the lawsuit, has ordered the city and SkyTel, the city’s paging contractor, to preserve all text messages sent and received on the city-issued SkyTel pagers of Kilpatrick and 33 other current or former city officials for selected periods between Sept. 1, 2002 and Oct. 31, 2007.
Disclosure in January of pager text messages sent and received by Beatty led to Monday’s charges against her and Kilpatrick. The messages point to an affair between Kilpatrick and Beatty and contradict sworn testimony Kilpatrick and Beatty gave at a police whistle-blower trial in 2007.
Southfield attorney Mayer Morganroth, who represents Beatty in the criminal case and represents Beatty, Kilpatrick and the city of Detroit in the federal civil case, said Yatooma is wrong and the criminal charges have no bearing on the civil case.
“There’s no evidence of the party” and “there’s no evidence that the party had anything to do with the death,” Morganroth said.
“Mr. Yatooma can pipe dream all he wants.”
Rosen said at a recent closed-door status conference he would deny Morganroth’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit, meaning the case will almost certainly go to trial, Yatooma said. He said a settlement with the city is highly unlikely.
Morganroth said he still expects the case to be dismissed after the judge determines text messages he ordered preserved have no relevance to Yatooma’s claims.
