Crimetown: Season Two
Welcome to Crimetown, a series produced by Marc Smerling and Zac Stuart-Pontier in partnership with Gimlet Media. Each season, we investigate the culture of crime in a different city. In Season 2, Crimetown heads to the heart of the Rust Belt: Detroit, Michigan. From its heyday as Motor City to its rebirth as the Brooklyn of the Midwest, Detroit’s history reflects a series of issues that strike at the heart of American identity: race, poverty, policing, loss of industry, the war on drugs, and our universal desire for a savior.
Chapter One | Stop the Robberies, Enjoy Safe Streets
Detroit, 1971—a city riven by blight, racial strife, and rising crime. In the first episode of Crimetown Season 2, the police form a controversial undercover unit called STRESS—Stop The Robberies, Enjoy Safe Streets. One of the unit’s cops kills so many black men that he earns a nickname: Mr. STRESS. Can anyone stop him?
Chapter Two | The Battle for Detroit
A police shooting outside a community center leaves two black teenagers dead. Protesters take to the streets, igniting a movement to elect the city’s first black mayor. As election day approaches, the future of a racially polarized city hangs in the balance.
Chapter Three | The Fat Man and the Field Marshall
Eddie Jackson and Courtney Brown are childhood friends from a poor neighborhood. Eddie is the troublemaker, drawn to Detroit’s seamier side; Courtney is his quiet, serious sidekick. As they grow older in a city with dwindling job options, they go their separate ways. But when Eddie dives into the heroin trade, Courtney faces a choice: play it safe and stay broke, or join his friend’s burgeoning empire and get rich.
Chapter Four | The Kingpins’ Kids
When a hungry young DEA agent arrives in Detroit, he picks the perfect case to make his bones: taking down Eddie Jackson and Courtney Brown’s sprawling heroin organization. But if the drug kingpins fall, what will happen to their kids? As the feds close in, Eddie Jr. and Courtney Jr. must face the possibility of growing up without their fathers.
Chapter Five | YBI to the Day I Die
It’s the early eighties, and a new organization is revolutionizing the heroin trade: Young Boys Inc. Unlike other drug operations, YBI recruits juveniles, brands smack as if it were designer clothing, and moves the industry out of the dope houses and onto the corners. As YBI’s relentless expansion causes more and more bloodshed, its foot soldiers must reckon with their impact on Detroit.
Chapter Six | The Mayor, the Barber, and the Babysitter
Coleman Young has more underworld connections than you might expect of a big-city mayor. Sometimes those connections come in handy. But when his favorite niece starts dating an infamous drug dealer, Mayor Young must choose between keeping her out of trouble and keeping his hands clean.
Chapter Seven | Who Killed Damion Lucas?
A thirteen-year-old boy is murdered in a drive-by shooting. The Detroit police quickly apprehend a suspect. But the FBI is convinced that the wrong man is in jail — and that the real killers are escaping justice thanks to friends in high places.
Chapter Eight | Operation Backbone
Still hung up on the unsolved murder of Damion Lucas, FBI agent Herm Groman devises an elaborate sting to ensnare the corrupt cops of the Detroit Police Department. Will it bring down Mayor Coleman Young, too?
Chapter Nine | Dimitri
Dimitri Mugianis is a rarity in Detroit: a white kid whose family stayed after everyone like them left. Growing up, he throws himself into the city’s avant-garde underworld, playing in art-punk bands and partying in gay clubs. But when his taste for the nightlife becomes a full-blown heroin addiction, he realizes that he’s in trouble—and, with a hot new drug called crack hitting the streets, it’s only going to get worse.
Chapter Ten | Right Here, Right Now
When Mayor Coleman Young dies after twenty years in office, he leaves a yawning vacuum in Detroit’s power structure. But a successor quickly arises: a young, ambitious state legislator named Kwame Kilpatrick. He’s charismatic, larger than life, and has an impeccable political pedigree. There’s only one person who can stop Kwame Kilpatrick: himself.
Chapter Eleven | The Hip Hop Mayor
To his supporters, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick is a new breed of politician: young, cool, and in touch with black culture. To his critics, his flashy appearance and taste for nightlife are evidence of his immaturity. Rumors about Kilpatrick begin to swirl: sky-high spending, an out-of-control entourage, and wild parties at the mayoral mansion. Is Kwame Kilpatrick in over his head? Or is he being targeted because of his race?
Chapter Twelve | Fake News
As rumors about a wild party at the mayor’s mansion continue to spread, Kwame Kilpatrick must fend off an increasingly unsympathetic media. Meanwhile, his opponent in the next election has a double-digit lead. Can the hip hop mayor survive?
Chapter Thirteen | Gary Brown v. Mayor of Detroit
Deputy Police Chief Gary Brown files a whistleblower suit against City Hall, alleging he was fired for investigating the long-rumored Manoogian Mansion party. Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick denies the accusations. But while he’s on the stand, he’s asked a surprising, seemingly unrelated question — one that just might bring him down.
Chapter Fourteen | The Affair
The revelation that Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick had an affair with his chief of staff — a romance detailed in thousands of explicit text messages — rocks Detroit. But it’s only the beginning of their troubles.
Chapter Fifteen | The Murder of Tamara Greene
With the mayor behind bars, a crusading lawyer takes up the case of slain exotic dancer Tamara Greene. Could Kwame Kilpatrick have ordered her murder — or is it all an urban legend?
Chapter Sixteen | Surrendered
After serving 99 days in jail, former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick walks free. He heads to Texas and tries to settle into a new life. But Detroit isn’t quite ready to let him go
Chapter Seventeen | Operation Bombay Dreams
For years, the FBI has been running a wide-ranging corruption investigation into the Kilpatrick administration. As they dig deeper, the feds uncover a massive pay-to-play enterprise that reaches every level of City Hall. Is Kwame Kilpatrick a crook? Or are his associates just exploiting his name in order to enrich themselves?
Chapter Eighteen | Untied States v. Kwame Kilpatrick
After a decade of scandals and a sprawling corruption investigation, Kwame Kilpatrick faces his most daunting challenge yet: a federal trial that could put him in prison for decades. The former mayor is no longer fighting for his political life or his marriage — now, he’s fighting for his freedom.
Chapter Nineteen | From the Ashes
In the Crimetown Season 2 finale, Kwame Kilpatrick begins his 28-year prison sentence. Although he still maintains his innocence, his chances of a retrial are slim. Meanwhile, Detroit is undergoing a remarkable economic transformation. But who is benefitting from the Motor City miracle? And is the era of crime and corruption really over?
Chapter Twenty | The Streets Don’t Love You Back
Growing up, Rob Boyd is ignored by his absent, womanizing father, a well-known local preacher. His mother marries a kindhearted factory worker, who helps raise Rob and his siblings. But after his stepfather is murdered, Rob goes astray, entering a brutal world of drugs and violence.