Mike Kellerman

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Detective Michael Scott Kellerman is a fictional character on the television drama series Homicide: Life on the Street portrayed by Reed Diamond. He is a main character from seasons 4-6, 1995-1998.

[edit] Biography

Kellerman was born in Baltimore to working class parents, the youngest of three sons. His father works at a distillery. He also has a sister who, by the time of the series, lived in St. Louis. He always wanted to be a cop and was a "good kid", quite different from his brothers Drew (Eric Stoltz) and Greg (Tate Donovan), who were always getting into trouble. Drew and Greg ended up drifting through much of the U.S., occasionally turning up to ask for money. They appeared in the fifth season episode "Wu's On First?" on the run from two bookies, owing a gambling debt to one and having stolen a Babe Ruth uniform from the other. They were estranged from their father, who referred to them as "hoodlums". Kellerman had recently been divorced from a crime lab tchnician named Anne Kennedy prior to Kellerman's joining the homicide unit. Kellerman would later confide with Meldrick Lewis that Anne had cheated on him.

Kellerman worked his way up through the Baltimore Police Department, eventually landing in the Arson unit. When a pair of teenagers were killed in a series of warehouse fires, Kellerman had to work alongside the Homicide unit. With Detectives Felton and Bolander on suspension, Lieutenant Al Giardello was impressed by Kellerman's work on the case and had him transferred to his unit. Although he initially refused the transfer, his father's statement that he works at the distillery because he's never done anything he wasn't already good at let him to accept the move to Homicide. Kellerman was partnered with Meldrick Lewis, with whom he would work during most of his time with the squad. Kellerman also crossed paths with Luther Mahoney and became determined to take down the drug kingpin after Mahoney arranged for the assassination of an intelligent, introspective and tired-of-the-game drug dealer who had had a chance to kill Kellerman but let him go unharmed.

[edit] Corruption scandal

Early in the fifth season, a federal grand jury was gathered to investigate corrupt cops in the arson unit, including Kellerman. He was put on desk duty, which greatly angered him because he felt it marked him as guilty. He had, in fact, been the only one of four officers investigated who had not taken money from a pair of arsonists (Matthew Roland and his son, Mitchell). Lieutenant Giardello went to Commissioner James C. Harris on Kellerman's behalf only to be told that no help was coming to the Homicide Unit from the Departmental commanders. Kellerman refused to "rat" on his fellow cops, but the grand jury eventually did not indict him because the prosecuting State's Attorney did not ask any questions about it during the grand jury proceedings, and later told him she didn't understand why good cops couldn't turn in bad ones and that he should "go be a cop". He could not put it behind him, however, as he was convinced no one would ever be completely sure that he wasn't corrupt. Intensely depressed and reeling from another case of Luther Mahoney getting away with murder, Kellerman slid into alcoholism and almost committed suicide, but Lewis managed to stop him from shooting himself.

While on desk duty, Kellerman met the new M.E., Julianna Cox, who had just lost her father. They consoled each other with a one night stand, then a rough, "not really together" kind of relationship until Julianna eventually left Baltimore near the end of season 6.

[edit] The Mahoney saga

Kellerman and Lewis were put in charge of a string of murders linked with drug kingpin and crime lord Luther Mahoney (Erik Todd Dellums). Innocents and gangbangers alike fell because of Luther, but there was never enough evidence to prosecute him for any of the crimes.

Eventually, a drug mule who had been transporting heroin from overseas was discovered dead in his motel room after one of the heroin-laden condoms in his stomach burst. The police decided to swap Luther's shipment with fake heroin, leading to a huge upset in his industry. Luther was monitored going to a meeting with one of his lieutenants — a meeting where he executed the lieutenant and inadvertently shot a bystander before speeding off.

Lewis pursued, and Kellerman and Narcotics Detective Terri Stivers hopped in a vehicle moments later. They sped back to Luther's condominium and stormed in, finding Luther with Lewis' own gun drawn on him. Kellerman gave three warnings, and Mahoney lowered, but did not drop, the gun. Kellerman then prepared to read Mahoney his rights, only getting as far as "You have the right to remain silent" before he shot Mahoney once, killing him. The detectives wrote up the incident as if Mahoney had had the gun raised, and the shooting was eventually ruled clean.

While Kellerman convinced himself that what he did was justified, Stivers was not so convinced, and Lewis eventually came to doubt it as well. Luther's empire was salvaged by his sister, Georgia Rae Mahoney (Hazelle Goodman), who was convinced that Kellerman had murdered her brother and sought revenge, initially attempting to blackmail Kellerman with non-existent video footage of the shooting (through which she was convinced that Kellerman had killed her brother in cold blood) and eventually deciding to sue the city through the help of a corrupt judge, Gerald Gibbons (Rick Warner), on her payroll. When the judge decided to cooperate with the FBI and dismissed the lawsuit, Kellerman's big mouth during a public ridicule of Judge Gibbons may have exposed this cooperation to the Mahoney organization and led to the judge's assassination.

[edit] Fallout

Georgia Ray's son, Junior Bunk (aka Nathaniel Lee Mahoney) (Mekhi Phifer), was eventually brought in for questioning after numerous high-ranking members of the Mahoney drug organization and a corrupt judge were found murdered. While in police custody, he seized a weapon from a desk drawer and started a firefight in the police station. Although he was ultimately shot dead by several cops (including both Kellerman and Lewis, as well as Lt. Giardello), detectives Gharty and Ballard were injured, and three uniformed officers were killed. The police went out in force, and Bayliss subsequently took a bullet to the ribcage while shielding Pembleton from a shooter. Georgia Rae was eventually found dead, killed by her own people. Gee had Detectives Frank Pembleton and Falsone confront Kellerman, who admitted that Mahoney had the gun lowered when he fired.

Rather than have himself, Lewis, and Stivers all discharged, Kellerman resigned the force per a deal offered by Giardello who told him that a jury outcome was unpredictable but that his fellow cops would be unharmed if he took the fall. He became a private investigator, but had lost the respect of most of the squad. As a P.I., Kellerman found himself opposed to his old coworkers when he worked to aid in the defense of a pair of teenagers who committed infanticide. In the end, however, Kellerman got to the truth and redeemed himself in the eyes of some of his former coworkers, particularly Det. Falsone, by anonymously providing them with information that boosted their case, even though it was not enough to prosecute. For most of this story, Falsone referred to Kellerman in an angry way and used his last name, but in their last conversation implied that Kellerman had slipped them the information and in perhaps a sort of redemption, calls him "Detective".

[edit] The TV movie

In the Homicide TV movie, Kellerman was one of the many former unit members to rally around when Lt. Giardello was shot down. He and Gee's son, Mike Giardello, investigated possible connections in Baltimore's Italian quarter, with Mike resorting to violence tactics while Kellerman stood guard. However, Mike's rage eventually proved too strong when he pulled a gun on an elderly man and Kellerman had to talk him down. Kellerman was last seen in the Waterfront, drinking with ex-M.E. Julianna Cox, who had also come down to help in the investigation.

[edit] Trivia

• In the episode "Something Sacred Part 2," Kellerman can be heard singing the song "If I Should Fall From Grace With God" by The Pogues as he drunkenly stumbles out of a bar. In Kellerman, P.I., he and Detective Sheppard repeat the phrase "pogue mahone," which was the name of a Pogues album.
• Reed Diamond and Michelle Forbes (Dr. Cox) dated while they were both on the show.