[MI] Update on hit-murder of Rose Cobb, wife of Detroit Police Sgt. David Cobb

Man charged in more killings in Detroit
He told of hits on cop's wife, others
By Ben Schmitt bcschmitt@freepress.com
and Suzette Hackney
Detroit Free Press
[EXCERPTS] Self-professed hit man Vincent Smothers is charged with three additional homicides in Detroit, including one that had not surfaced in a previous confession. Smothers, 27, was recently arraigned on three more counts of first-degree murder in connection with killings from July 2006 through January 2007. He faces a total of six charges of first-degree murder... When Smothers was arrested in April, he confessed to killing seven people from August 2006 to December 2007. He told police he was paid between $5,000 and $15,000 for the jobs, and began to feel remorse for his actions only after he killed a Detroit police sergeant's wife. Smothers said he walked up to Rose Cobb, 47, as she sat in a vehicle in a CVS parking lot in Detroit on the day after Christmas and fatally shot her in the face and head as her husband, Sgt. David Cobb, shopped inside. Rose Cobb's slaying went unsolved for months, until Smothers was arrested and confessed to being hired by David Cobb to kill his wife. David Cobb was arrested a day after Smothers was, but Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said there was not enough evidence to charge him. Cobb remains free but suspended. He has said through his attorney that he never met Smothers... Smothers' name also surfaced last month in a civil lawsuit. Detroit police investigator Ira Todd asserted that he was transferred from a high-profile task force after he turned up an allegation linking Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick to a reputed upper-level drug dealer. Todd said in the lawsuit that he established a link between Smothers and a reputed drug dealer in Lexington, Ky., who claimed to have personal and professional connections to Kilpatrick. After telling his superiors about the drug dealer's claims, Todd said he was told to take a vacation. He said he then was transferred out of the violent crimes task force, where he had worked since 1994, to a precinct. He said his bosses told him to turn over all the reports that referred to a link between Kilpatrick and the drug dealer. "He was told not to do anything further on it at all. Period," Todd's lawyer Mike Stefani said. [Full article here]