Two Detroiters. Two hockey players. Two intense dudes.
On the second-to-last day before the jury gets the case in the trial of Kwame Kilpatrick, Fox 2 reporter M.L. Elrick and defense attorney Mike Rataj got into it on the steps outside the federal courthouse in downtown Detroit.
The defense on Thursday stressed how the federal law enforcement apparatus had paid special attention to Kilpatrick and co-defendants Bobby Ferguson and Bernard Kilpatrick -- all of whom are black -- and defense attorney Gerald Evelyn had quoted Martin Luther King Jr.
Elrick asked Rataj if the government is racist.
Rataj, pronounced RAT-i, took exception to that question.
"Did I say anything about that?" Rataj asked. "Are you ignorant?" He added: "You're an ignorant moron."
As Rataj walked away, Elrick said: "C'mon, Mike, answer the question. Be a man."
Rataj approached Elrick and asked: "Be a man?"
Rataj then shoved Elrick and the two exchanged heated words.
"You want to go right now?" Rataj asked Elrick. Rataj then called Elrick "a piece of garbage."
At one point it looked like they were going to come to blows, but in the end Rataj walked away and Elrick went to work on his report for Fox 2 News.
"For the record, I like Mike Rataj," Elrick said. He added that the attorney might be "wound a little tight."
Let It Rip
Later at 10:30 p.m., on Fox 2’s show “Let It Rip” Elrick and Rataj appeared together, both wearing hockey gloves, in a good natured discussion about the earlier event and the trial. Both appeared rather chummy.
“I think it was unfortunate that this is the story of the day,” Rataj said.
Rataj said it was an emotional day watching his co-counsel and dear friend, Gerald Evelyn, deliver a passionate closing argument on behalf of their client, Bobby Ferguson. And he took offense to the question about race and Martin Luther King Jr.
Rataj said he wanted to make it clear that he “never ever ever” implied the U.S. Attorney’s Office or the judge are racist. He said he loves the judge.
The exact words of Elrick's question outside of court were: "Is the government racist? Is that what you're saying?"
Elrick held up a picture of Rataj with a halo over his head and said, "This is the Mike Rataj I know. "
Elrick likened the heated exchange to a hockey game.
“You play the game, you line up against each other, you breathe in each other's face. Game's over, you shake hands, you're friends, you meet at the bar.”
Elrick went on to say it was undeniable that race has been an issue in the trial.
The show’s host Huel Perkins asked Rataj: “How are you guys as of tonight?”
“After this trial is over,” Rataj said, “I’m going to take him out and buy the first couple rounds. How's that? ”
“Are those rounds from a 30 ought six?” Elrick joked.
On Friday, as Jim Schaefer of the Free Press -- Elrick's partner in exposing Kilpatrick's text messages -- wound up his reader-interactive live blog on freep.com, he offered his opinion on who would win in a throw-down between Elrick and Rataj.
"I might have to go with the Rat," Schaefer wrote. "Don't tell my buddy."
Click on the Fox2 Detroit link to see the video from Fox 2.
