OK, so Kwame's problems aren't just about his affair and perjury; it turns out that there's also possible favors for friends in city contracting, the infamous Manoogian Mansion stripper party is back, and by gum if this doesn't also have a whiff of murder about it:

A retired Detroit Police Department clerk came forward Monday to say she saw a police report in 2002 in which stripper Tamara Greene described being attacked by Carlita Kilpatrick, wife of Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, during a party at the Manoogian Mansion.

The court affidavit by former clerk Joyce Carolyn Rogers of Troy marks the first time a Detroit police employee has stated that a report on the long-rumored party and assault exists.

Rogers told the Free Press she came forward on the advice of her psychiatrist.

"According to the report, the mayor's wife walked into a room and witnessed Ms. Greene touching Mayor Kilpatrick in a manner that upset the mayor's wife," Rogers, 65, said in the affidavit. "The report further states that the mayor's wife witnessed this, left the room and returned with a wooden object in her hand and began assaulting Ms. Greene."

The report indicated Greene was taken to a hospital because she was injured, Rogers said. "It was clear to me as a clerk working in records that Ms. Greene wanted to press charges against Carlita Kilpatrick," Rogers said in the affidavit.

It's a mystery that never had a definitive answer, the story of a Detroit stripper known as Strawberry who was killed in a hail of gunfire while sitting in a car with her boyfriend in the predawn darkness of April 30, 2003.

Since then, Detroit police and Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick have combated persistent rumors and lawsuit allegations that Tamara Greene was killed because she danced at a wild party at the Manoogian Mansion.

Despite repeated denials by the mayor and a state investigation that dismissed the claims as urban legend, the story has persisted and is being fueled by fresh allegations raised by a former homicide detective as part of a lawsuit filed on behalf of Greene's 14-year-old son.

In a 10-page affidavit filed Friday in U.S. District Court in Detroit, former Lt. Alvin Bowman says he believes Greene, 27, was killed by a Detroit cop and that police officials derailed his homicide investigation.

"I suspected that the shooter was a law enforcement officer, and more specifically, a Detroit Police Department officer," Bowman said in the document.

Spend a few moments scrolling through the Detroit Free Press archive of Kilpatrick scandal-related coverage and your jaw will drop. Considering that Kwame is just the latest in a long line of lousy officials in Detroit, it's really no surprise that a once-great city has been reduced to a hellhole. This is the sort of thing that happens when the politics of a city become entirely dominated by race, bad economics, and corruption.


Michigan Central Station, Abandoned - Corktown, Detroit


Tiger Stadium, Abandoned - Corktown, Detroit