Detroit Free Press from Detroit, Michigan • Page 15

Ut I HUI I t-Hfcfc KHtSSSUNUAY, AUGUST 2, 1987 1 5A Arrest provides glimpse at lethal world of ex-con i 5 1 2 nwt. 1 a bird's-eye view of Detroit as he riimiYti 'riffitf1" Till" 1 WILLIAM DEKAYDelroit Free Press rides the People Mover with his godmother. Rosalind Holmes of Detroit. CAMPBELL, from Page 1A habitual criminal and possessing unregistered firearms. Campbell has spent 30 of the last 40 years viewing the world from behind bars.

But he is bright enough, Patterson notes, to have become a pretty fair self-taught lawyer. "He's not stupid. He's not some dumb street person," Patterson said. In the years after his office "put away" Campbell in 1977, Patterson said he "received three reams, and I'm not kidding, of legal documents" from Campbell. Patterson said many of Campbell's "self-initiated, self-written pleadings" were well done, and "at least two of which, if my memory serves me, went as far as the U.S.

Supreme Court." A man who was formerly associated with Campbell, who spoke on condition that he not be named, agreed that Campbell is "fairly knowledgeable about the basics of criminal law, but that's primarily because he's been involved in criminal activities for so long. He's literally got an awful lot of firsthand knowledge, particularly about how to conduct himself in court." CAMPBELL is "a very Intelligent person who ordinarily is not given to emotional outbursts," the former associate said. "He's very cool and conducts himself like a businessman and relates to everything in his life that way. It's always a matter of business with him." It was in the early 1970s that law enforcement officials began making Campbell their business. During those years, Campbell was charged with assault with intent to murder a star witness in what became the longest criminal trial in Detroit history, the so-called "Pingree Street Conspiracy." At the end of the seven-month trial, a group of police officers and civilians was convicted of operating a heroin sales operation on the west side of the city.

Campbell had been one of the 28 defendants originally indicted in the heroin conspiracy. But the indictment against him was dropped for insufficient evidence, as was the assault with intent to commit murder charge. By then, law enforcement agencies had begun collecting information that led them to believe that Campbell was a People Mover rail on The recorded station announcements were punctuated by pauses. "This is the, Michigan, Station," the voice would say. "For $200 million, they could get a guy who could talk right," said one rider.

"Is that Coleman Young's voice?" another asked later. The daytime highlight was the sharp curve through through the black steel skeleton of Cobo Hall construction; after it was over and the squeals subsided, some called it Disneyland and others said Cedar Point. THE NIGHTTIME highlight was the view up Jefferson and its long lines of bright headlights and taillights; Greektown and the river looked pretty fine from the air, too. In all, it felt like you were really in a big city. "There was my first office," a man told some kids as Car No.

2 passed by the abandoned Madison Theater building. "Right there. They called this the theater district." Look at that, people said when they saw a lady mannequin waving from a third-floor fire escape near the Broadway Station, a shopping bag in hand. Wow, they said when they discovered the businessman reading the newspaper in the Grand Circus Park Station was not real, but only a statue. Oooh, they said when they saw the striking purple-and-green mosaic at the Cadillac Center Station.

It you had been on the Paris Metro, you compared it with that. If you rode the New York subway, you compared it with that. But no subway had a view like this. "Wonder if it'll take to graffiti?" one man asked. A couple of punk-rock types stood ,4 Car No.

2 at a door of Car No. 2, near a sign that said "Please do not block doorway." One pulled from his pocket a small self-adhesive picture of Sid Vicious, the dead punk-rocker cult figure, and past: ed it neatly above the sign. "Sid," he said, "please do not block the FOR ONE circuit, riders on Car No. 2 were entertained by a young would-be comedian, a bad one at that, who boarded at the RenCen Station he said along the curve before the Bricktown Station. "Where's the loop-de-loop?" "Come on, he said en route, to the Greektown Station.

"Make fun where there is none!" "I feel motion sick!" he said on the way to Cadillac Center. "Refueling!" he announced during a delay at Times Square Station. "Libation in the People Mover station!" he said at Millender Center; "Variety is inertia!" he said later. At least, that's what it sounded like. And when the RenCen Station was announced, he yelled: "Hear that, Toto? We're going home!" "Does that mean you're getting off?" someone yelled, and everybody cheered.

One young man curious, or both pushed the emergency intercom button late in the evening. "This is the control center," came a voice. "Can I help you?" The rider was caught off "Where the hell am he asked. "Pardon me?" the voice said. "Where am "You're on your way to Times Square Station," the voice said.

"Have a nice ride." PHIL DONAHUE just two hours! told, and his face fell. "I told them I was going to the bathroom," he said. Joe Louis Arena took a beating. "They have the steepest stairs," one woman said as No. 2 passed by the arena.

"Did you ever go to anything there?" "No," a second woman said. "Unless your feet are size four, you can hardly put a foot on the steps," the first said. "And what's the average size foot these days a seven or eight?" "I don't know," the second said. And on another pass, a woman said: "We went there, and we had to take the back roads through the mud. I got mud all over my shoes." "That's the only way to get to Joe Louis, I think," said a second.

"I've never figured out how you're supposed to get there." EVERYBODY in the world, it seemed, was on the People Mover, and so it was only natural that some renewed old acquaintances. "Hi!" said an older man. "Hi!" responded a young woman. "You haven't been to church in ages!" he said. "I'm not going back until that weirdo is gone," she said.

"Who?" he said. "That guy who chased me through the church exposing himself," she said. For a minute there, Car No. 2. was stopped between stations, two stories above Farmer Street, nothing but a sheer drop to the pavement on each side.

"Please remain inside the train," came a voice over the intercom, and everybody looked at each other kind of funny. IF YOU CHARLES hired assassin who acted as an enforcer for various drug dealers. And then Campbell gave Investigators a gift on an icy ribbon of road in Keego Harbor at 3:30 a.m. on Feb. 6, 1975.

AFTER SIDESWIPING a police car, Campbell was arrested when officers found a cocked and loaded semiautomatic pistol on the front seat of his car. They also found a Magnum rifle, semiautomatic pistol, a sawed-off shotgun and 15 packets of heroin in the car. But the biggest prize was the notebooks, which were found In the trunk. They contained the names, home addresses and car license plate numbers of 300 law enforcement officials, undercover narcotics officers and the victims of execution-style slayings. One notebook had detailed drawings of the homes of several of the people on the list.

Another listed the secret locations where witnesses scheduled to testify In the "Pingree Street Conspiracy" were living under police guard. Oakland County investigators, working closely with their counterparts from the Wayne County Organized Crime Task Force, concluded that the 300 names were possible "hit list" victims. One of the names scrawled in the notebook was that of L. Brooks Patterson, who said he was provided information that satisfied him that Chester Campbell was a contract killer. "A lot of that was never made public, but there was so much there his activities and files yes, I was convinced that he was exactly what they said he was," Patterson said.

HE SAID that during his 18 years as a prosecutor, the only instance in which he had "ever taken extra precautions and used extra security for my family and myself was with this guy." Campbell's 1975 arrest prompted a flurry of activity. Investigators searched his home in the 5200 block of Ivanhoe in Detroit and found $280,000 in cash as well as more weapons and documents. A search of his girlfriend's home in Commerce Township in Oakland County uncovered more drugs and documents. And numerous internal investigations, to determine how Campbell got secret and sensitive data from the files of police and state agencies, were ordered. Campbell was convicted of drug and weapons charges, and of being a habitual criminal, in Oakland County.

Later, he was convicted of weapons violations in U.S. District Court in Detroit. He was released on parole in September 1984. Campbell's arrest on July 22 was, in some respects, a carbon copy of the Keego Harbor incident in that federal officials were shocked by what they uncovered. As he was leaving his home on Ivanhoe, agents from the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) surrounded the 1981 black Dodge Diplomat he was driving and ordered him from the car.

A loaded two-shot derringer was found in the right rear pocket of Campbell's slacks. A gun that looks like a ballpoint pen and fires a bullet was found, loaded, in the breast pocket of his suit coat. INSIDE the car, agents found six more guns; one of them a semiautomatic pistol with a silencer. They also found drugs, money and several memo books, one of which contained "numerous names and addresses as well as the names of subjects who are currently being Investigated by law enforcement," according to documents filed in U.S. District Court In Detroit.

Inside Campbell's house, agents found a tie-clip microphone, a pair of "Bionic Ears" for overhearing conversations from a distance, and more drugs, weapons and documents. The agents also found a room that looked like a law office, filled with books, legal briefs and a typewriter. On bookshelves nearby were more than 200 volumes, most of which dealt with a single subject: homicide. According to court documents, found together in the house were: a gray false beard and mustache, a "Design a Face" disguise kit, a semiautomatic pistol with a silencer attached, a pair of plastic gloves and a pair of leather gloves. Campbell, who has been charged with federal drug and weapons charges, is being held In a 10-by-10-foot maximum-security cell in the Wayne County Jail.

On Wednesday, he will be taken under tight security to the U.S. District courthouse in downtown Detroit for a hearing on the charges, for which he could be imprisoned for 50 years if convicted. And Detroit police officials are making arrangements with federal authorities to test all of the weapons confiscated from Campbell. If ballistics comparisons verify that any of the weapons were used In unsolved Detroit slayings, Campbell could be charged again with being a hit man. Gregory Calloway.

3, of Detroit gets Riding the PEOPLE MOVER, from Page 1A RenCen Station, as she fanned herself with a piece of paper and took up a seat and a half. The transit officials pleaded with riders to get off so others could ride. "Fifty percent off everything at Trappers Alley!" one yelled in vain. It was, as one man said, "full-contact mass transit." Don't shove, one lady warned, "you're in Detroit." "Yeah, don't honk your car horn in Detroit either," said another. "I learned that real fast." The wisecrackers were out in force.

"Hold up!" yelled a green-jacketed transit official at the Financial District Station, as too many people were trying to get on at once. "There's been a holdup on the People Mover," a passenger yelled. "Nice view," one man said later, as Car No. 2 passed by the dilapidated Heritage Hotel building. "Yeah," another said.

"Abandoned buildings and trashed streets." "These seats are inflatable," a rider announced during the breathtaking stretch along the river. "If we happen to go into the water, just pull the cord." Riders were tickled to see the Financial District Station signs. "I didn't know we had a financial district," one said. AND WHEN the Broadway and Times Square stops were announced, some wondered out loud if they were in the right city. "How long does it take for this thing to go all the way around the track?" asked a young man who boarded at Trappers Alley, where he worked.

"Fifteen or 20 minutes," he was soundoff Restrictions on "Star Wars" program? The Soviet Union Friday presented a draft treaty calling for the two superpowers to cut their long-range nuclear arsenals in half, but it said no agreement was possible unless an accord is reached that would restrict the U.S. "Star Wars" program. Do you think the United States should agree to restrictions on Star Wars to achieve a major reduction in the long-range nuclear arsenals of both countries? YES, 64 percent: "There are a hundred, places where that money could be used much better than for that stupid Star Wars program." "And now is the time to remove Reagan from office." "Absolutely. We should do away with Star Wars; it's Insane." NO, 36 percent: "Not yet. We must have a good thing in Star Wars that worries the Russians." "Our negotiating position would be lost and we would have to start spending money on other arms buildups." "This is the only protection that we've got that the Russians are afraid of and we've got to keep it to protect our country." Soundoff Is a non-scientific, reader-opinion feature.

Percentages are based on 267 calls. Today's question: President Reagan's nomination of Robert Bork to the Supreme Court has drawn complaints from liberal senators, but friends say he is not the grimly rigid right-wing ideologue that his opponents have portrayed. (Story on Page IB.) Do you support Bork's nomination? ABE NOT USING THE I. GIVEWS STRATEGIES YOU'RE LOSING MONEY. Look at what Among Tke Items Confiscated From Campbell from His Car A loaded two-shot derringer.

A silver ballpoint pen gun, 5V Inches long, loaded with a long shell. A black notebook "containing numerous names and addresses as well as the names of subjects who are currently being Investigated by law enforcement." Cash and money orders totaling $10,791. i A plastic bag containing white powder. Two plastic bags filled with marijuana. A business envelope containing a smaller brown envelope containing heroin.

A loaded Colt Python revolver. A loaded semiautomatic pistol with attached silencer. A loaded revolver. A loaded revolver. A loaded pump shotgun.

A video camera with cartridges and other accessories. A large plastic bag containing blasting caps and "unidentified explosive devices." A loaded semiautomatic pistol. A flare gun and rounds. A portable police scanner. A Statue of Liberty knife.

A telescope. Taken from His House 21 one-kilogram packages of marijuana. A loaded revolver. A loaded revolver. A 12-gauge bolt-action shotgun.

Two CB receivers, One tie-clip microphone. A 12-gauge pump shotgun, A 12-gauge double-barreled, sawed-off shotgun. A silencer. A target pistol. $5,000.

Apalrof'BionicEars" (microphone, ear piece and dish). A gray false beard and mustache. A "Design a Face" disguise kit. A semiautomatic pistol with a silencer attached MA pair of plastic gloves. A pair of leather gloves.

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