At the federal trial of disgraced former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, every day in court is a mini high school reunion, writes Laura Berman in The Detroit News.
Once you get past the shock of all those illicit C-notes stuffed in bags and bras, you realize the Kilpatrick and Friends trial is in part the story of a group of friends emotionally stuck in the social strivings of their Cass Tech high school days together.
Their grown-up world is one where everyone has a nickname (Derrick Miller is "Zeke," Bobby Ferguson's wife is "Cookie," Bobby is "Bro" and Kwame is "Black") and meets in their secret clubhouse — an ante room adjacent to the mayor's office decorated with a barber chair. "Zeke" Miller called it "The Barber Room."
On Monday, testifying in his steel-framed glasses and suit and tie, Miller looks his own part: A bright young man whose career flowered only when he fell back into the Kilpatrick orbit — first as an aide to then U.S. Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, then as part of the Kwame brain trust.
Miller didn't portray himself as a reluctant player: He accepted cash — $10,000 in hundreds on two occasions, he said — and carried cash — "a lot" of it — to Kilpatrick, at least 10 times more.
What did Kilpatrick say when he delivered the cash? He was asked.
"Cool."
