Detroit

Vandals whitewash Joe Louis sculpture

A Superior Township parks commissioner and his roommate were in Detroit police custody Monday, suspected of vandalizing the Joe Louis fist statue in downtown Detroit and leaving the photos of two slain Detroit police officers on the monument’s base.

Police said Monday they were unsure whether the white paint splattered on the sculpture early Monday symbolized racism or some other type of political statement against violence in Detroit.

Detroit police said they didn’t have a clear motive as to why the two Washtenaw County men allegedly used mops to smear gallons of glossy white paint over the 24-foot-long fist at the foot of Jefferson and Woodward.

Detroit police spokesman Glen Woods called it a mystery.

“They haven’t given police an exact reason on why they did it,” Woods said. “An investigator said one of them has alluded to the fist being representative of violence in Detroit.”

San Francisco

Attorney general seeks ruling on gay marriages

California’s attorney general plans to ask the state Supreme Court on Friday whether San Francisco’s approval of same-sex marriages violates state law.

Monday’s announcement by Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer came after San Francisco filed a constitutional challenge to California’s prohibitions on same-sex marriages.

Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger urged the attorney general last Friday to “take immediate steps” to get a court ruling to make the city stop the gay weddings.

Lockyer, a Democrat, said he agreed that immediate action was necessary because of the statewide concern over the issue.

“The people of California who have enacted laws that recognize marriage only between a man and a woman, and the same-sex couples who were provided marriage licenses in San Francisco deserve a speedy resolution to the question of the legality of these licenses,” Lockyer said.

More than 3,000 same-sex couples have been married since San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom decided to give out the licenses Feb. 12.

Washington, D.C.

Administration wants Lewis & Clark park

Fort Clatsop National Memorial in Oregon would be expanded and renamed the Lewis & Clark National Historical Park under a plan put forth Monday by the Bush administration.

The move comes as the nation celebrates the bicentennial of the 1803-06 expedition to the Pacific Ocean by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. The plan would add three sites along the lower Columbia River to the federal park, expanding it for the first time into Washington state.

“Lewis and Clark traveled on both sides of the river and in both states. In fact, they saw the Pacific from Washington. So it’s very fitting we have a park that fits into both states,” Interior Secretary Gale Norton said.

The plan is expected to cost about $8 million, mostly for land acquisition and personnel. Congress has appropriated $1.5 million for the Fort Clatsop expansion, and the administration is seeking another $6.25 million for the project next year.

Norton said she expected bipartisan support in both the House and Senate.

Boston

Church abuse victim, 29, found dead

Patrick McSorley, who accused defrocked priest John Geoghan of molesting him and became one of the most outspoken victims in the Boston Archdiocese sex scandal, was found dead Monday at 29.

The cause of the death was not immediately disclosed. McSorley nearly drowned in a river last year but denied he had attempted suicide.

Attorney Mitchell Garabedian said police called him early Monday and told him McSorley’s body was found in a friend’s apartment in Boston. Another friend said the apartment was a haven for drug users.

McSorley’s lawsuit in the Geoghan case was among the first of hundreds eventually filed against the archdiocese. The church settled with 86 plaintiffs, including McSorley, for $10 million in 2002. Geoghan was beaten and strangled in prison last year.