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Thnk2mch
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Username: Thnk2mch

Post Number: 143
Registered: 02-2006
Posted From: 67.38.87.62
Posted on Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - 6:13 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Detroit
Rosa Parks, Proof share Woodlawn mausoleum
It's insult to rights leader, some say

April 26, 2006

Email this Print this BY JOE SWICKARD and CECIL ANGEL

FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS




Proof's given name, Deshaun Dupree Holton, is inscribed on the wall of the mausoleum where he is entombed near Rosa Parks at Woodlawn Cemetery in Detroit. (AMY LEANG/Detroit Free Press)
People wanting to pay homage to civil rights icon Rosa Parks at Detroit's Woodlawn Cemetery Chapel named in her honor will now have to pass by the crypt of rapper Proof, who was killed in a shootout in an after-hours bar.

The rapper's crypt -- with golden lettering spelling out his given name of Deshaun Dupree Holton set above his professional name Proof -- is just inside the main entrance of the gothic stone chapel. Parks' crypt is just around a corner from Proof's, in the most prominent section of the building.

"I tell you, this is a lot to take in; I'm pretty much stunned," said Parks' nephew William McCauley.

"I don't see the appropriateness of someone like this young rapper being buried with Rosa Parks," McCauley said. "She was a person of nonviolence. And obviously this young rapper had a different creed when it comes to resolving issues."

The burial of a performer whose music could be a raw and rude reflection of tough urban life so close to Parks, also jarred McCauley's attorney, Lawrence Pepper of Farmington Hills. Pepper said Parks -- whose arrest in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Ala., city bus sparked a nonviolent revolution that helped sweep away legal racial segregation -- exemplified dignity and steely resolve.

"I don't think his music is anything like Mrs. Parks," said Pepper. "To me, it's disrespect to Rosa Parks."

Benjamin Chavis, former executive director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and a cofounder of the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network, said he had worked with both Parks and Proof. He said Parks would not have turned Proof away.

She "sacrificed for freedom, justice and peace and she lived her whole life around those principles," he said. "And I think it's obvious she would not agree with discrimination in life or death."

Proof's attorney David Gorosh referred questions to Interscope, Proof's recording label. Interscope spokesman Dennis Dennehy declined comment.

Repeated calls to officials of Mikocem, the parent company of Woodlawn Cemetery, were not returned.

On Tuesday, a vase of white flowers before Proof's crypt could be seen through the chapel's locked doors.

Proof died in a gunfight at the C.C.C. nightclub on 8 Mile, which started, police said, in a dispute over a pool game. Proof allegedly pistol-whipped and fatally shot Army veteran Keith Bender Jr. before being killed himself by Mario Etheridge.

Etheridge, Bender's cousin, faces a preliminary examination today in Detroit 36th District Court for two gun-related felonies. He was not charged with Proof's death.

While some hailed Proof -- who helped craft Eminem into an international cultural figure that transcended race -- as a valued Detroit music ambassador, law enforcement officials often viewed him otherwise. They pointed to Proof as a close associate of Thelmon Stuckey III, a major drug gangster serving a life sentence for a drug-related murder, and someone with a history of public brawls.

Naming the chapel, built in 1895, for Parks earlier this year and setting a new price list for crypt and cremation urn spaces there also were met with some controversy. McCauley feared the naming and new prices were driven by mercenary considerations.

Four other occupied crypts could be seen Tuesday in the section of the chapel where Proof is buried.

Individual crypts in the chapel were priced at $24,275 after the renaming and renovation. They were $17,000 before space was donated for Parks, her husband and her mother after Parks' death.

Company officials, at that time, said the prices were set to help cover structural and security upgrades and were in line with making it a premier burial site. Woodlawn has long been a site for famous Detroiters, including the Fords and other auto families.

Mikocem is under investigation by the Michigan Attorney General's Office, but spokesman Rusty Hills declined to reveal details of the probe.

In Parks' final years, a tangle of lawsuits grew around the use and protection of her name. In 1999 after OutKast, a hip-hop duo, used her name without permission in a song, OutKast was sued on Parks' behalf in a case that was later dismissed.

In 2004, a second suit was filed seeking $5 billion from record companies and bookstore chains that sold the recording. The settlement in that suit has been sealed.

There never has been a formal arrangement between Woodlawn and the Raymond and Rosa Parks Institute for Self Development. Cemetery officials said they had planned to voluntarily donate 2% of sales in the chapel to the organization Parks founded to provide youth programs.

However, cemetery officials said that Elaine Steele, Parks' longtime associate and caregiver, told them the institute did not want any funds from the sale of space within the chapel.

Jon Gandelot, an attorney for the Parks estate, said comments about occupants of the final resting places within the chapel are perhaps better left to a higher authority.

"It's really not my position to judge," Gandelot said.

Contact JOE SWICKARD at 313-222-8769 or jswickard@freepress.com.

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs .dll/article?AID=/20060426/NEW S01/604260437
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Lmichigan
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Username: Lmichigan

Post Number: 3602
Registered: 10-2003
Posted From: 67.172.95.197
Posted on Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - 6:31 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Sorry, but beyond the irony, one gets the death their loved ones are willing to pay for. As much as it may pain some to realize, this is a Woodlawn mausoleum, not Rosa Parks' personal mausoleum.
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Dmb
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Username: Dmb

Post Number: 181
Registered: 11-2003
Posted From: 69.246.55.57
Posted on Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - 8:05 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

At least we can rest easier knowing that while their remains may be quite close, their souls are in very different places.
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Detroit_stylin
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Username: Detroit_stylin

Post Number: 2659
Registered: 10-2003
Posted From: 66.202.227.12
Posted on Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - 8:08 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I think all of this is really much ado about nothing to be honest...
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Gistok
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Username: Gistok

Post Number: 2021
Registered: 08-2004
Posted From: 4.229.186.76
Posted on Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - 8:13 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

It's not as though Park's heirs have a veto as to who gets to be interred in the public mausoleum.

Statistically speaking, there are probably quite a few folks interred in that mausoleum who are roasting in hell right now.
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Ravine
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Username: Ravine

Post Number: 31
Registered: 01-2006
Posted From: 71.144.83.114
Posted on Wednesday, April 26, 2006 - 10:09 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I don't give a rat's ass about Proof, but if his people (family? Eminem?) have the $24,000 to pay for the crypt, it's really nobody's business, and what kind of person he may, or may not, have been is also irrelevant.
I don't wish to be offensive, but enough with the Rosa Parks Is God bullshit, already. Somebody had the bucks to put Proof in that place, and if Rosa Parks' family or lawyers-- or everyday folks, citizens of Detroit-- don't like it, that's their problem. Nobody's memory has been f'ing desecrated here.
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Rocket_city
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Username: Rocket_city

Post Number: 14
Registered: 04-2006
Posted From: 141.217.174.213
Posted on Thursday, April 27, 2006 - 9:23 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

^ Maybe it was the guy who won the $5 bucks at the pool game Proof lost?
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Chitaku
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Username: Chitaku

Post Number: 208
Registered: 03-2006
Posted From: 68.43.107.72
Posted on Thursday, April 27, 2006 - 10:45 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

The thing that bothers me about the Rosa Parks is god situation is that when she was alive, nobody even noticed her, she just sat in some rundown apartment in the hood. Where was all the people that were on the street as her body passed when she was alive.
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Genesyxx
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Username: Genesyxx

Post Number: 498
Registered: 02-2004
Posted From: 12.2.196.17
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 9:42 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Would there be beef if Proof's people went the same time as Rosa's? Looks like we need police protection!
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Danny
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Username: Danny

Post Number: 4048
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Posted From: 141.217.174.235
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 9:56 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

NOOO!!! Don't put that thug with the Mother of Civil Rights Leader.

The Gangsta Rapper Proof represents THUG LIFE of the human being while Rosa Parks represents the FREEDOM of Mankind.

Proof through his EVIL teachings by means of his music can show the young generation how a kill a innocent person, get the bling, pimp up your cars, get the women to be your boy toy harem, and rebel against all authority.

Rose Parks through her teachings can show mankind that Segregation is NOT the answer to the race promblem in America. FREEDOM, LIBERTY AND EQUALITY is the greatest solution to all of mankind where people in color can do the things they want for common good of society and make their names for themselves in history and do the impossible.

Rose Parks legacy must be remembered all over America

Proof's legacy must NOT be remembered for he was just a man who rebel against America so he could get what he wants. He's a terrorist and I don't his tomb by Rosa Parks.
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Viziondetroit
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Username: Viziondetroit

Post Number: 369
Registered: 11-2003
Posted From: 65.42.23.2
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 10:11 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

I hate the bandwagon sympathy people show when someone dies... "Proof was the greatest rapper of all time" <- most people can't name 2-3 songs he was on. "He was the nicest person you would meet" <- man I hate when people almost make people Saints when they die just because they died...

They did it for Rosa Parks and just about everyone else they dies, BAND WAGON.
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Lowell
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Username: Lowell

Post Number: 2544
Registered: 10-2003
Posted From: 66.167.58.162
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 10:52 am:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

That article is more about the death of journalism than the death and interment of Proof. It must me a terribly slow news day.

"All emnity shall cease at death."
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Jfre66_77
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Username: Jfre66_77

Post Number: 29
Registered: 01-2006
Posted From: 12.15.1.161
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 1:47 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

This kind of in-depth, hardhitting reporting is one of the main reasons that I don't get the Free Press. Now I'm mad at them for the three minutes that I just lost reading this story.

Lowell you are right - must be a slow news day.
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Jimelnino
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Username: Jimelnino

Post Number: 407
Registered: 06-2005
Posted From: 68.250.43.213
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 1:52 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

Wow, I can't believe this warranted a whole article.

Does the Parks family get the final say on who is and who is not allowed into the mausoleam? I don't think so.
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Danny
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Username: Danny

Post Number: 4055
Registered: 02-2004
Posted From: 141.217.174.229
Posted on Friday, April 28, 2006 - 7:07 pm:   Edit PostDelete Post   Move Post (Moderator/Admin Only)

No Viziondetroit! Proof was the WORST rapper of all time. He was just his " LA VIDA LOCA!" before he died on behalf of a personal vendatta.

Move his tomb away from Rosa Parks and a gave him a unproper burial at some water filled up graveyard plot somewhere in Clinton TWP.

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