Geoffrey Fieger, the firebrand lawyer and failed Democratic candidate for governor, is on the brink of an attempt to turn his legal offensive against the Detroit Police Department into a run for the city's mayor.

Fieger, who represents relatives of two men killed in the most recent of Detroit's controversial police shootings, said in an interview with The Detroit News that the cases make it "much more likely" he'll run for mayor next year -- a campaign he's publicly flirted with since the night he lost to Gov. John Engler in 1998. The attorney, involved in cases ranging from Jack Kevorkian's defense to the Columbine shooting, said he wouldn't run if Mayor Dennis Archer decides to seek re-election, but there is widespread speculation Archer won't run.

Fieger hardly acts on every one of his many public pronouncements on politics, his threatened campaign against Sen. Spence Abraham being the latest example. And he'd face significant obstacles if he decided to run -- not least among them the fact that he'd have to move from his Bloomfield Hills home by next spring, or that he or any other white candidate would face questions from Detroit's mostly black voters.

But Fieger said, and some observers agree, that his already high popularity with African Americans could go even higher as he attacks the city's black political leaders as absent on the shootings issue.

"There's a power vacuum. I don't see any leadership," Fieger said.

Fieger hinted his political and legal strategies would be similar: Establish that Detroit's police department is reckless in its use of deadly force, and that leaders from Mayor Dennis Archer to the city's powerful black ministers have failed to speak out.

"We have a majority black police force, a black police chief and a black mayor, and yet the department is killing black citizens," he said. "It's no less outrageous than the Malice Green case. Ordinarily, the city would be burning down. But there almost seems to be an acceptance of this violence."

Grand-scale plan

Fieger might make an easy target for potential opponents. Certainly he will face accusations that he's ambulance-chasing on a grand scale.

"The only interest he has in the city of Detroit is a moneyed interest," said Greg Bowens, Archer's spokesman. Lawsuits in the cases of shooting victims Errol Shaw and Dwight Turner would be the 14th and 15th Fieger has filed against the city, Bowens said -- suits that could bring Fieger's law firm millions of dollars in fees.

"There have been no altruistic activities on his part that suggest he cares for Detroit beyond what kind of money he can squeeze from the taxpayer," Bowens said.

"Immediately my question is, 'Is he really serious?' " said Joe Darden, an urban affairs expert at Michigan State University. "That would be unusual, to try to run given the demographics of the city, and I'm sure he knows that."

Fieger's answer: He, like President Clinton, would be a white candidate with broad appeal to blacks.

"There's a popular, racist belief in the two newspapers that a white candidate can't win in Detroit, and that's nonsense," he said.

Fieger drew 60 percent of the vote in Detroit during the 1998 Democratic gubernatorial primary, a race against two out-state white candidates. He got 87 percent of Detroit votes in the race against Engler that year -- fairly close to what Democratic candidates received in previous elections.

Field of contenders

And he receives enthusiastic reactions from African Americans at events such as the July protest at Fairlane Town Center in Dearborn over Frederick Finley's death.

Whether that would translate into votes is unclear.

"I like Fieger," said Carolyn Smith, 72. "But I don't think I'd vote for him for mayor."

Asked why, she struggled to find the right words: "I guess I just like what he's doing now," she said. The fact that he would have to move to the city would hurt Fieger, she said.

There has been much speculation about whether Archer will run again, especially if political ally Al Gore wins the presidency and offers him a job in Washington.

Any field of candidates to succeed Archer as mayor would be crowded. At least a dozen local politicians have been mentioned as possible contenders, from Deputy Mayor Freeman Hendrix to Police Chief Benny Napoleon to City Councilman Nicholas Hood.

But no likely candidate would have Fieger's name recognition. "With each high-visibility case he takes on gives him more recognition and increases his chances of becoming a serious candidate," Detroit political consultant Mario Morrow said.