Civil rights icon Rosa Parks has a new neighbor at Detroit’s Woodlawn Cemetery. Visitors to her gravesite will now have to pass by the crypt of rapper Proof, who was recently killed in a shootout in an after-hours bar.
The rapper’s crypt is just inside the main entrance of the chapel named in Parks’ honor. Her crypt is just around a corner from Proof’s, in the most prominent section of the building.
“I don’t see the appropriateness of someone like this young rapper being buried with Rosa Parks,” said Parks’ nephew William McCauley. “She was a person of nonviolence. And obviously this young rapper had a different creed when it comes to resolving issues.”
McCauley’s attorney, Lawrence Pepper of Farmington Hills was equally offended. “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 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.
While some hailed Proof – who helped craft the career of Eminem –
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.
Sources: Vibe.com, Mediatakeout.com, mtv.com, www.freep.com