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Banned Media Report: City Of Lies · Conspiracy! The Show

0:10
Speaker 1: Wait, true true.
0:14
Speaker 2: I'm a check both true stat That.
0:16
Speaker 1: Is, Hey, everybody, welcome to a very special episode of
0:35
Speaker 1: Conspiracy the Show. I'm your host, Adam Todd Brown. What
0:39
Speaker 1: makes this a special episode?
0:42
Speaker 2: Two things.
0:43
Speaker 1: For one, I'm by myself. It's a solo episode. There's
0:47
Speaker 1: no one here but me and you who us only
0:52
Speaker 1: we can hear us scream right now. It's probably a
0:55
Speaker 1: weird way to put it, but yeah, this is a
0:57
Speaker 1: solo episode. One of my co hosts'll be back next week.
1:01
Speaker 1: I'm assuming unless this just goes really fucking well and
1:06
Speaker 1: somehow I'm able to just do one solo podcast a
1:09
Speaker 1: week and make a living at that, then everyone can
1:13
Speaker 1: fend for themselves. But the other thing that makes this
1:16
Speaker 1: a very special episode is it's the first in what
1:20
Speaker 1: I hope will be a series of solo episodes that
1:25
Speaker 1: I'm calling banned media reports. I've described what I do
1:30
Speaker 1: in the past as just getting paid to do book reports,
1:34
Speaker 1: and that's mostly accurate, but sometimes not just books. Sometimes
1:38
Speaker 1: it's documentaries and movies and FBI dot vault dot gov archives,
1:44
Speaker 1: or maybe it's vault dot FBI dot gov one of
1:47
Speaker 1: the two. Check it out sometime. My favorite website on
1:51
Speaker 1: the Internet. Enter your favorite celebrities name today. The results
1:54
Speaker 1: will shock you anyway. One thing I come across pretty
1:59
Speaker 1: regular while researching episodes of this podcast is that a
2:04
Speaker 1: lot of times there will be a usually a book,
2:08
Speaker 1: but sometimes just a video that not only provides the
2:12
Speaker 1: basis for the conspiracy theory that I'm researching, but also,
2:17
Speaker 1: for some reason, is mysteriously hard to find. And on
2:23
Speaker 1: these episodes I'll be tracking down those sources and telling
2:27
Speaker 1: you what they're all about, what's in them. One example
2:31
Speaker 1: we did in episode recently about a documentary called The
2:35
Speaker 1: Origins of AIDS. The reason the episode was based on
2:39
Speaker 1: that documentary is because the book the theory is based
2:43
Speaker 1: on is basically only available to the elites at this point.
2:48
Speaker 1: It's called The River, A Journey to the Source of
2:51
Speaker 1: HIV and AIDS. It's written by a guy named Edward Hooper.
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Speaker 1: On Amazon right now, the cheapest copy is seventy five dollars,
3:00
Speaker 1: and that's for a paperback copy in acceptable condition. Elsewhere
3:06
Speaker 1: the cheapest copy is closer to one hundred and thirty dollars,
3:09
Speaker 1: so it's like a goddamn textbook. So of course I
3:13
Speaker 1: bought a copy and I'll be doing an episode about
3:16
Speaker 1: it soon. I do need time to read it. And
3:19
Speaker 1: if you paid close attention to that entire last few
3:22
Speaker 1: sentences there, it might seem like I'm implying that by
3:26
Speaker 1: buying a copy of this book, I am somehow myself
3:30
Speaker 1: an elite. And I just want to make it clear that, yes,
3:33
Speaker 1: that is absolutely what I'm saying. Write it down anyway.
3:37
Speaker 1: This week, I'm not talking about a book. I'm talking
3:41
Speaker 1: about a movie, a movie that I have wanted to
3:45
Speaker 1: see for two years now, ever since trailers for it
3:50
Speaker 1: started appearing in theaters back in May of twenty eighteen.
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Speaker 2: That movie is called City of Lies.
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Speaker 1: It's a twenty eighteen films starring Johnny Depp and Forrest Whittaker,
4:03
Speaker 1: and it's about LAPD involvement in the murder of rapper
4:08
Speaker 1: Notorious Big real name, Christopher Wallace. Sidebar, if you're one
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Speaker 1: of those people who only listens to Conspiracy the show
4:18
Speaker 1: and not any of my other podcasts, First of all,
4:22
Speaker 1: you better not be fucking listening to other podcasts by
4:25
Speaker 1: other people. It better just be mine. But also, I
4:28
Speaker 1: do host a bunch of other podcasts. One of them
4:30
Speaker 1: is called The Nineties sucked And for the past two
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Speaker 1: episodes we have been covering the LAPD's Notorious Rampart scandal
4:40
Speaker 1: and the murder of Notorious Big. And it probably won't
4:44
Speaker 1: surprise you at all to know that my conspiracy theorist
4:47
Speaker 1: heart follows me to that podcast also, so maybe check
4:51
Speaker 1: it out if you want more information about what's covered
4:55
Speaker 1: in the movie City of Lies.
4:57
Speaker 2: But back to the movie.
4:58
Speaker 1: It's based on the two thousand and two book Labyrinth,
5:02
Speaker 1: and it's based on the files of former LAPD detective
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Speaker 1: Russell Poole, who was the lead detective on the Notorious
5:10
Speaker 1: Big murder case. Produced and distributed by Global Road Entertainment,
5:16
Speaker 1: at least it was supposed to be. It was set
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Speaker 1: to premiere in the United States on September seventh, twenty eighteen.
5:23
Speaker 1: Like I said, trailers for it in theaters and everything.
5:27
Speaker 1: Then about a month before the release date, the movie
5:31
Speaker 1: was indefinitely pulled from the schedule. The reason given at
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Speaker 1: the time was Johnny Depp's on set behavior, specifically an
5:41
Speaker 1: incident in which it's alleged that he punched the film's
5:45
Speaker 1: location manager after a dispute over when they could and
5:50
Speaker 1: could not film, and right off the bat Does that
5:52
Speaker 1: sound right? This movie was shot between December twenty sixteen
5:56
Speaker 1: and May twenty seventeen, meaning this incident would have happened
6:01
Speaker 1: sometime between then. A full year later, in May twenty eighteen,
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Speaker 1: the trailer starts showing in theaters. Then, out of the blue,
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Speaker 1: with one month to go before the premiere, it's pulled
6:15
Speaker 1: because of a lawsuit over an on set fight. Man
6:19
Speaker 1: The Twilight Zone movie still came out, and three people
6:23
Speaker 1: died while filming that The scene where those people were
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Speaker 1: killed is in the movie. Granted, that was a different time,
6:33
Speaker 1: So how about some more recent examples. In twenty fifteen,
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Speaker 1: Miya Djovivic's stunt double, a woman named Olivia Jackson filed
6:42
Speaker 1: a lawsuit after she lost an arm and was in
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Speaker 1: a coma for seventeen days as a result of an
6:50
Speaker 1: onset injury. That suit was settled in twenty twenty. Guess
6:54
Speaker 1: what happened between that injury and that lawsuit being settled,
6:58
Speaker 1: The Resident Evil movie he was working on was released.
7:02
Speaker 1: Another example the twenty eighteen horror movie Incident in a Ghostland.
7:07
Speaker 1: On the set of that film, actress Taylor Hickson suffered
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Speaker 1: a disfiguring facial injury after she crashed through a glass
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Speaker 1: door during filming. She filed a lawsuit. That movie still
7:20
Speaker 1: came out. So if the makers of fucking Incident in
7:23
Speaker 1: a Ghostland can overcome a lawsuit to put their movie out,
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Speaker 1: I'm pretty confident the people behind a big budget film
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Speaker 1: starring Johnny Depp and Forrest Whitaker could probably do the
7:34
Speaker 1: same thing if they really wanted to. Also, the website
7:38
Speaker 1: The Daily Beast interviewed several people who were on set
7:43
Speaker 1: during the making of City of Lies for an article
7:48
Speaker 1: called inside the Shocking death of Johnny Depp's biggie murder
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Speaker 1: movie City of Lies. It's written by a guy named
7:55
Speaker 1: Justin Roorlick. We'll link to it on the website. Here's
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Speaker 1: a quote from one of the people that they interview,
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Speaker 1: who was on the set when this incident happened. They
8:05
Speaker 1: had a little moment. There weren't punches, there wasn't anything,
8:09
Speaker 1: just where in each other's faces for a second. We
8:12
Speaker 1: shot for maybe another hour and a half. After that
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Speaker 1: we went inside. We finished, and the locations guy came
8:19
Speaker 1: up to Johnny and they hugged and it was all cute,
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Speaker 1: and that was it. That's a quote from script supervisor
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Speaker 1: Emma Danoff, who was sitting next to Johnny Depp when
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Speaker 1: that alleged incident happened. They interviewed three other crew members,
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Speaker 1: who all backed up her version of events. City of
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Speaker 1: Lies director Brad Furman didn't learn the movie was pulled
8:40
Speaker 1: until August during a conference call with producers, even though
8:44
Speaker 1: industry data shows it was shelved as early as July nineteenth.
8:49
Speaker 1: Randall Sullivan, who co wrote the book the movie is
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Speaker 1: based on, said he was immediately suspicious on account of
8:56
Speaker 1: how hard Global Road was selling him on the reason
9:00
Speaker 1: why this movie had to be pulled. This is a
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Speaker 1: quote from him, also from that Daily Beast article. She
9:05
Speaker 1: was trying so hard to sell the narrative that this
9:08
Speaker 1: was all about the bad publicity for Johnny. And when
9:11
Speaker 1: someone's trying too hard to sell it comes through. I thought,
9:16
Speaker 1: you know, why is she trying so hard to convince me?
9:18
Speaker 1: If that's true, then she could have just told me
9:21
Speaker 1: matter of factly. But she's going on and on about
9:24
Speaker 1: all the research they've done, and that has made me
9:27
Speaker 1: start thinking is there something else to it? The movie
9:32
Speaker 1: is directed by a guy named Brad Furman, and when
9:36
Speaker 1: making this movie he became one of very very few people,
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Speaker 1: law enforcement included, who've actually seen the complete unredacted case
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Speaker 1: files from the investigation and the federal probe into the
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Speaker 1: LAPD Rampart Division and the murder of Christopher Wallace, and
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Speaker 1: some of that non public information does make its way
10:00
Speaker 1: into this movie, which, if you're looking for a reason
10:03
Speaker 1: why it might have been pulled, there you go. Even
10:08
Speaker 1: at the outset of filming, Furman started receiving veiled threats
10:13
Speaker 1: and suggestions that he shouldn't make the movie. Perry Sanders,
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Speaker 1: who is a lawyer for Valetta Wallace, Christopher Wallace's mom,
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Speaker 1: told Furman that making the movie could be a risk.
10:23
Speaker 1: A friend with ties to the LA underworld told him
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Speaker 1: not to make the movie, and a cop friend who
10:29
Speaker 1: he hadn't spoken to in fifteen years contacted him out
10:33
Speaker 1: of the blue and told him not to make the movie.
10:37
Speaker 1: That same cop friend also told him to cover the
10:40
Speaker 1: camera on his computer so no one could hijack his
10:43
Speaker 1: laptop and figure out a way to frame him. The
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Speaker 1: Daily Beast also talked to an FBI agent for their article.
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Speaker 1: He said this as bad as the crime was in
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Speaker 1: the Biggie Murder and all the other corruption. The cover
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Speaker 1: up far exceeds I think what the crime was. I
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Speaker 1: think when this movie comes out, there's going to be
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Speaker 1: a lot of people scrambling and running for the hills
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Speaker 1: because they're not going to want to have to answer
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Speaker 1: some questions about the corruption that was going on at
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Speaker 1: the LAPD. And he also told them that the main concern,
11:16
Speaker 1: which I think is pretty obvious, would be that if
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Speaker 1: this movie were to come out, it could revive the
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Speaker 1: civil lawsuit that Valletta Wallace filed against the LAPD, which,
11:29
Speaker 1: as is mentioned in the movie, Christopher Wallace his future
11:33
Speaker 1: earnings potential was through the roof, like billions of dollars probably,
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Speaker 1: So if you're talking financial damages in terms of what
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Speaker 1: was taken from Valletta Wallace, it's going to be a
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Speaker 1: lot of money. And it's a lawsuit that the LAPD
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Speaker 1: might not survive, or, as that same FBI agent in
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Speaker 1: this article puts it, the lawsuit would absolutely completely bury
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Speaker 1: and ruin the LAPD, and more importantly, would shut down
12:04
Speaker 1: all the different task forces that the LAPD had with
12:08
Speaker 1: the FBI as well as other federal agencies from which
12:12
Speaker 1: they get all that federal grant money, not to overstate it.
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Speaker 1: It would basically shut down the LAPD. They could not
12:21
Speaker 1: afford to take that hit. As I've probably mentioned on
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Speaker 1: this podcast before, definitely on other podcasts, this is the
12:29
Speaker 1: third attempt to make this movie. Sylvester Stallone was the
12:34
Speaker 1: first person attached to it. I'll link to articles from
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Speaker 1: back in two thousand and three when it was announced
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Speaker 1: that he was going to be making this movie. It
12:42
Speaker 1: was supposed to be an HBO movie. He was going
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Speaker 1: to play Russell Poole. By two thousand and six, he
12:48
Speaker 1: was quoted as saying this about the project. The story
12:51
Speaker 1: was like a modern day noir, written from the point
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Speaker 1: of view of Detective Pool, who basically was railroaded out
12:58
Speaker 1: of the police department because the more where he investigated,
13:01
Speaker 1: the dirtier. The high rollers in city hall and police
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Speaker 1: commissions and DA offices all appeared to be part of
13:09
Speaker 1: a conspiracy to squash this case. I don't think it'll
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Speaker 1: ever be done because of the amount of lawsuits that
13:16
Speaker 1: would be filed. It's also well known that Leonardo DiCaprio
13:21
Speaker 1: was lined up to play Russell Poole in a version
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Speaker 1: of this movie that was being produced by Fucking DreamWorks.
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Speaker 1: The official movie studio of the Illuminati. Here's what Randall
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Speaker 1: Sullivan says in that same Daily Beast article about that
13:35
Speaker 1: the Los Angeles Police Department is the most politicized police
13:39
Speaker 1: department in the country, and its relationships with financial powers
13:43
Speaker 1: and political powers in the city and in the state
13:46
Speaker 1: and even in the country are I think unprecedented. I
13:50
Speaker 1: saw the way they were able to martial resources to
13:53
Speaker 1: oppose making this movie. There may have been other things.
13:57
Speaker 1: I don't think it was based mainly or entirely on
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Speaker 1: political pressure, but DreamWorks was clearly scared by the things
14:03
Speaker 1: they were getting told. They were getting scared off this project.
14:08
Speaker 1: I don't know if I mentioned earlier, but Randall Sullivan
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Speaker 1: is the guy who wrote Labyrinth, which is the book
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Speaker 1: based on Russell Poole's investigation. Or maybe I did mention
14:18
Speaker 1: it and I just gave myself something new to edit out.
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Speaker 1: Either way, I know what you're probably thinking. But Adam,
14:24
Speaker 1: there's a whole USA Network television series based on the
14:28
Speaker 1: murders of Notorious Big and Tupac, and it's based on
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Speaker 1: Russell Pool's investigation. Sure, but a few things about that.
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Speaker 1: For one, it's not based on Russell Pool's investigation. It
14:41
Speaker 1: references Russell Pool's investigation, but it's based on LAPD Detective
14:46
Speaker 1: Greg Cating's investigation, and conveniently, his version of events implicates
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Speaker 1: the LAPD way way less. Also, if you watch that
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Speaker 1: USA series, his the version of events are centered around
15:02
Speaker 1: what very much in the series looks like a coerced confession.
15:07
Speaker 1: It also, again conveniently, came out after Russell Pool died,
15:13
Speaker 1: so he wasn't around to protest or dispute the show's
15:16
Speaker 1: version of events, which kind of paint him as a
15:19
Speaker 1: crazy person who was just wrong. So, yeah, there's a
15:24
Speaker 1: TV show out there about it, and I don't trust
15:26
Speaker 1: it one fucking bit.
15:28
Speaker 2: Just the fact that it got made when all.
15:32
Speaker 1: Of these other attempts to tell a very similar story
15:36
Speaker 1: all got mysteriously shut down, that alone makes me suspicious.
15:41
Speaker 1: All that said, the movie City of Lies did manage
15:45
Speaker 1: to make its way out into the world. On January tenth,
15:49
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, the film premiered out of competition as the
15:54
Speaker 1: closing film of the Noir In Festival in Italy, which
15:59
Speaker 1: just means it wasn't part of the film festival.
16:02
Speaker 2: Like there was no judging. I guess no.
16:04
Speaker 1: It wasn't eligible for awards. It's just the movie they
16:08
Speaker 1: chose to close that festival out with. It was also
16:11
Speaker 1: released on Blu Ray in Italy on June nineteenth, twenty nineteen,
16:17
Speaker 1: So with this being twenty twenty in all that means
16:21
Speaker 1: this movie can be found if you want it bad enough.
16:26
Speaker 2: How did I get it?
16:27
Speaker 1: Obviously, I purchased a legal copy from Italy, along with
16:31
Speaker 1: a compatible Blu Ray player that would allow me to
16:34
Speaker 1: watch it here in the United States, and then I
16:38
Speaker 1: immediately set both of those things on fire because I
16:43
Speaker 1: don't want that kind of heat on me. I don't
16:45
Speaker 1: want to be in possession of such an inflammatory piece
16:48
Speaker 1: of work, So I disposed of it right away prove
16:52
Speaker 1: I didn't bitch. I bought it with bitcoin. But also
16:55
Speaker 1: there's torrents all over the Internet, and you could probably
16:58
Speaker 1: just download it that way.
17:00
Speaker 2: None of that matters.
17:01
Speaker 1: What really matters is I've seen this film, and I'm
17:05
Speaker 1: gonna tell you about it. I don't think we need
17:07
Speaker 1: to worry too much about spoilers. You know, the general
17:10
Speaker 1: way it ends, two young men in the prime of
17:13
Speaker 1: their respective lives are murdered, and no one has ever
17:15
Speaker 1: held accountable for it. I guess the most important question
17:19
Speaker 1: should be addressed right up front. Is City of Lies
17:22
Speaker 1: a good movie? Yeah, it's fucking great and it probably
17:26
Speaker 1: would have killed at the box office. Johnny Depp is
17:29
Speaker 1: great in it. Forrest Whittaker is great in it. Purely
17:33
Speaker 1: from an entertainment standpoint, I recommend watching this movie.
17:37
Speaker 2: It's a good movie.
17:38
Speaker 1: Of all the movies made about Notorious Big and Tupac,
17:43
Speaker 1: City of Lies is the best of those movies. It
17:46
Speaker 1: opens with a depiction of a really famous incident, a
17:50
Speaker 1: road rage incident between two off duty LAPD cops, Frank
17:54
Speaker 1: Liga and Kevin Gaines. Liga shot and killed Gaines. Neither
17:59
Speaker 1: of the two men knew the other was a Coplega
18:02
Speaker 1: was white, Gains was black. So this happened hot on
18:06
Speaker 1: the heels of the Rodney King verdict and the subsequent
18:09
Speaker 1: LA riots. So this incident was well on its way
18:13
Speaker 1: to being labeled as a racist cop killing a black
18:17
Speaker 1: man for racism reasons, and Russell Poole was the lead
18:21
Speaker 1: detective assigned to that case. This incident, in real life
18:26
Speaker 1: absolutely happened, and it's what eventually brings the LAPD's infamous
18:32
Speaker 1: rampart scandal to light. And if you're unfamiliar again, we
18:36
Speaker 1: just did an episode of the ninety sucked about it.
18:38
Speaker 1: But that was a massive police corruption scandal in which
18:42
Speaker 1: LAPD officer Rafael Perez, who'd recently been implicated in stealing
18:46
Speaker 1: cocaine from the LAPD evidence room and selling it on
18:50
Speaker 1: the street, testified against as many as seventy of his
18:53
Speaker 1: fellow cops for crimes ranging anywhere from unjustified shootings to
19:00
Speaker 1: drinking on the job. It costs the city of La
19:03
Speaker 1: millions of dollars in settlements, led to a five year
19:06
Speaker 1: period where the Department of Justice oversaw police reforms within
19:10
Speaker 1: the LAPD. And this movie makes a really shocking claim
19:15
Speaker 1: about that scandal, and I think that might be the
19:18
Speaker 1: key to why this movie got shut down, But we'll
19:21
Speaker 1: get to that. So after the road rage incident in
19:24
Speaker 1: the opening, the movie turns to Forrest Whittaker's character, who
19:28
Speaker 1: is a journalist just named Jackson who shows up at
19:32
Speaker 1: Russell Pool's apartment hoping to get information about the case.
19:36
Speaker 1: They team up, and I think Jackson is actually meant
19:41
Speaker 1: to represent another theory and another investigation into Notorious Big,
19:49
Speaker 1: which was by Chuck Phillips. It appeared in The La Times,
19:53
Speaker 1: I think in two thousand and three, and his claim
19:57
Speaker 1: was that the Notorious Big Christopher Wallace actually paid for
20:02
Speaker 1: the hit on Tupac and that he was killed out
20:06
Speaker 1: of revenge over that. And that theory that Notorious Big
20:11
Speaker 1: went to Las Vegas and paid for Tupac to be
20:14
Speaker 1: killed has actually been pretty heavily discredited, and in this
20:19
Speaker 1: movie it's Forrest Whittaker's character who represents that theory instead,
20:24
Speaker 1: as opposed to it being Chuck Phillips. I think it's
20:28
Speaker 1: the movie taking some creative liberties to get all of
20:31
Speaker 1: the pertinent details in without making it a six hour
20:36
Speaker 1: Netflix series, which it will probably be someday. And then
20:40
Speaker 1: they give us a brief rundown of the events of
20:44
Speaker 1: Christopher Wallace's murder, one of two times they do that
20:48
Speaker 1: in the movie.
20:49
Speaker 2: Is everyone familiar with how that murder happened?
20:52
Speaker 1: Because it's a really complex murder for something that history
20:57
Speaker 1: has tried to write off as a simple gang shooting,
21:02
Speaker 1: just another drive by. Here's how it happened. Basically, Christopher
21:07
Speaker 1: Wallace and Shawn Combs are leaving the Peterson Auto Museum
21:12
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles. They were at a soul train Awards
21:16
Speaker 1: after party, and they're in separate cars. The car that's
21:20
Speaker 1: carrying Shawn Combe's Puff Daddy is in front, Christopher Wallace's
21:25
Speaker 1: car is behind him. A security detail for Bad Boy
21:29
Speaker 1: Records is behind Christopher Wallace's car. Shawn Combs blows through
21:34
Speaker 1: a yellow light for security reasons, Like any security person
21:39
Speaker 1: is going to tell you that it's better to be
21:42
Speaker 1: moving than stopped in a situation where you're concerned about
21:46
Speaker 1: your security, So they blow through this yellow light. Christopher
21:50
Speaker 1: Wallace's car stops at the red light. He's got his
21:54
Speaker 1: security detail behind him. At that point, a white Toyota
21:59
Speaker 1: land Cruiser makes a U turn and tries to wedge
22:03
Speaker 1: itself in between his security detail and Notorious BIG's car.
22:08
Speaker 1: At that moment, a black Chevy and pala Ss comes
22:13
Speaker 1: driving up the street really fast, pulls into the right
22:17
Speaker 1: lane next to Notorious BIG's car, empties the clip from
22:21
Speaker 1: a handgun into that car, killing Notorious Big instantly. That
22:26
Speaker 1: car speeds off into the night, never to be seen
22:29
Speaker 1: or heard from again. At that point, that white suv
22:33
Speaker 1: backs out of traffic and gets the fuck out of there.
22:35
Speaker 2: Also, that is a hit.
22:37
Speaker 1: That's a fucking execution. And it clearly took some coordination.
22:42
Speaker 1: You had to be in the right place at the
22:45
Speaker 1: right time to pull that off. And that's why Russell
22:49
Speaker 1: Poole always suspected that it was more than just a
22:53
Speaker 1: drive by shooting.
22:54
Speaker 2: It was an assassination.
22:57
Speaker 1: So anyway, back to the movie, Pool showed up at
23:00
Speaker 1: the Kevin Gaines shooting scene. Great quote in nineteen ninety seven,
23:05
Speaker 1: everybody thought the LAPD was filled with only one thing,
23:08
Speaker 1: racist cops, but it wasn't.
23:10
Speaker 2: It also had politicians.
23:13
Speaker 1: That's a reference to the Gaines shooting and the idea
23:16
Speaker 1: that in the wake of Rodney King, the LAPD was
23:19
Speaker 1: really determined to paint that road rage incident as a
23:23
Speaker 1: rogue racist cop killing a black man, and that all happened.
23:27
Speaker 1: But in the course of his investigation, Russell Poole not
23:30
Speaker 1: only finds video evidence that exonerates Frank Liga, but also
23:34
Speaker 1: finds evidence that Kevin Gaines was working for sug Knight
23:38
Speaker 1: and death Row Records.
23:40
Speaker 2: Weird.
23:40
Speaker 1: He also this is in the movie, meets a Jamaican
23:44
Speaker 1: bodyguard for death Row who later reveals himself to be
23:48
Speaker 1: not only not Jamaican man, but he's actually an FBI
23:52
Speaker 1: special agent who's managed to infiltrate death Row Records. Everyone
23:57
Speaker 1: knows about death Row Records, right suge Knight owned it.
24:00
Speaker 1: Huge rap label. In the early to mid nineties, Doctor
24:04
Speaker 1: Dre's Chronic album came out on death Row. The first
24:08
Speaker 1: Snoop Dogg album was a death Row album. And sug
24:12
Speaker 1: Knight is a real character. He has come up on
24:16
Speaker 1: this podcast a few times, I believe. Specifically, we've talked
24:20
Speaker 1: about the FBI files that are available on that same
24:26
Speaker 1: website I mentioned earlier, Vault dot FBI dot Gov. Go
24:31
Speaker 1: there and type into pac Shakur sometime. Pay special attention
24:35
Speaker 1: to the part about him being targeted in an extortion
24:38
Speaker 1: scheme near the end of his life. It's redacted, but
24:41
Speaker 1: give it a good read. I think you'll figure out
24:44
Speaker 1: the name of the person who was complicit in targeting
24:47
Speaker 1: him in that anyway, death Row Records was a record
24:52
Speaker 1: label that was suspected of also being a criminal organization.
24:57
Speaker 1: The owner of death Row Records, sug Knight, was a
24:59
Speaker 1: member of the Bloods, and what Russell Poole uncovers while
25:04
Speaker 1: investigating the Kevin Gaines incident is that Kevin Gaines was
25:09
Speaker 1: working for death Row Records as a security guard in
25:14
Speaker 1: his off time when he wasn't protecting and serving. And
25:18
Speaker 1: what is explained in this meeting with this FBI agent
25:22
Speaker 1: who had infiltrated death Row in the movie is that
25:25
Speaker 1: Suge Knight and death Row Records have the LAPD in
25:29
Speaker 1: their pocket.
25:30
Speaker 2: And we know that to be true.
25:32
Speaker 1: There were at least six LAPD officers who worked as
25:37
Speaker 1: security guards for death Row Records in their off time,
25:41
Speaker 1: and most of them did not report that they were
25:44
Speaker 1: working for death Row Records, which is a crime. You
25:47
Speaker 1: have to report what you're doing in your off duty
25:50
Speaker 1: as a cop so as to avoid conflict of interest
25:53
Speaker 1: in things. I don't know if it's crime, but cops
25:56
Speaker 1: are supposed to do it. And this FBI agent also
25:59
Speaker 1: says that he's heard rumors that Shug and death Row
26:02
Speaker 1: were involved in the murder of Notorious Big. So Pool
26:06
Speaker 1: manages somehow to get promoted to LAPD Robbery Homicide Division,
26:11
Speaker 1: which did happen in real life, and his first assignment
26:15
Speaker 1: is the murder of Notorious Big and the first person
26:18
Speaker 1: he's put in contact with is a gangster named Psycho Mike,
26:21
Speaker 1: who is a real life figure from this case. He
26:24
Speaker 1: says that sug Knight also has said that death Row
26:28
Speaker 1: was involved in the murder of Notorious Big and that
26:30
Speaker 1: the hit was orchestrated by a guy named d Mack.
26:34
Speaker 1: He also describes the shooter and gives them a name,
26:37
Speaker 1: Amir Muhammad. Amir Muhammad is a really important name in
26:42
Speaker 1: this case. There are two different composite sketches of Biggie's
26:47
Speaker 1: shooter and they both look like the man who was
26:50
Speaker 1: later identified as Amir Muhammad.
26:53
Speaker 2: But we'll get there first.
26:55
Speaker 1: There's a really fun moment in the movie where Jackson
26:58
Speaker 1: is demanding to run with the name of the shooter,
27:02
Speaker 1: Amir Mohammad, and Pool tells him not to, And when
27:06
Speaker 1: Jackson says he's going forward anyway, Poole says, no, no, no,
27:10
Speaker 1: no no. If you want a name, I'll give you
27:12
Speaker 1: the real name. And the name he gives him Stanley
27:15
Speaker 1: Kirk Burrell.
27:17
Speaker 2: Everyone know who that is?
27:18
Speaker 1: Mc hammer And Forrest Whittaker takes this back to his
27:21
Speaker 1: newsroom and starts gloating about scooping the name of Christopher
27:26
Speaker 1: Wallace's shooter, and it turns out it's just EMC Hammer.
27:30
Speaker 1: So how crazy is it that mc hammer killed Notorious Big?
27:34
Speaker 1: What if that's where this movie was going this whole time.
27:37
Speaker 1: That would be amazing. But no, it was just just
27:39
Speaker 1: a little highjinks, just a little joke Russell Pool pulled
27:42
Speaker 1: on him. I don't know if that happened in real life,
27:45
Speaker 1: but it seems too specific to not have happened, right,
27:48
Speaker 1: I don't know. So then there's a scene where Russell
27:52
Speaker 1: Pool walks Jackson through the time. He almost convinced his
27:57
Speaker 1: partner in robbery homicide at the LAPD being involved in
28:02
Speaker 1: this murder might be a thing worth pursuing, and he
28:05
Speaker 1: says he had him convinced for one night, and then
28:07
Speaker 1: the guy made a trip to New York, came back
28:11
Speaker 1: and said, no, your story's not right. We should just
28:14
Speaker 1: focus on gang members instead. And what they end up
28:18
Speaker 1: finding is both police and gang members all in one person.
28:24
Speaker 1: There's a bank robbery that is depicted in the movie
28:27
Speaker 1: that also happened in real life, and the person who
28:31
Speaker 1: is eventually arrested for carrying out that bank robbery in
28:35
Speaker 1: conjunction with his girlfriend who worked at the bank as
28:37
Speaker 1: a manager, is a guy named David Mack. The d
28:41
Speaker 1: MAC named by Psycho Mike. A few scenes earlier, Psycho
28:45
Speaker 1: Mike also being a real person involved in this case.
28:48
Speaker 1: And it turns out d Mac is David Mack, an
28:52
Speaker 1: LAPD officer who in his spare time does security work
28:57
Speaker 1: for death Row Records, also a member of the Blood,
29:00
Speaker 1: just like Kevin Gaines. So they arrest David Mack and
29:05
Speaker 1: in his garage, Russell Pool finds a shrine to Tupac,
29:10
Speaker 1: a black Chevy and pala ss that looks just like
29:14
Speaker 1: the car Biggie Shooter was driving, and a bunch of
29:16
Speaker 1: walkie talkies that Pool suspected were used by the conspirators
29:21
Speaker 1: to communicate on the night of Christopher Wallace's killing. Nevertheless,
29:26
Speaker 1: the LAPD refuses to let Russell Pool test that in
29:30
Speaker 1: pala for gunshot residue. And why would that be if
29:34
Speaker 1: not just to avoid the impending lawsuit that would result
29:38
Speaker 1: from an investigation of that nature. Notorious Big Again was
29:43
Speaker 1: twenty four years old, future earning potentials were incalculable. Almost
29:49
Speaker 1: a civil lawsuit of that nature would break the LAPD.
29:53
Speaker 1: And this is one of the really interesting moments in
29:57
Speaker 1: the movie because one of the whole in this theory
30:01
Speaker 1: has always been that no one ever identified David Mack
30:04
Speaker 1: or any of the other Death Row affiliated cops at
30:07
Speaker 1: the scene of Biggie's murder. I think that's even mentioned
30:11
Speaker 1: in the USA Network series. But Russell Poole always contended
30:16
Speaker 1: that because they were so intent on covering up officer
30:19
Speaker 1: involvement in the murder, the LAPD refused to let the
30:22
Speaker 1: full details of his investigation be made public, even filed
30:27
Speaker 1: a lawsuit over it at one point. Well, in this movie,
30:31
Speaker 1: which is based on those unredacted files, he does indeed
30:35
Speaker 1: talk to a witness who identifies David Mack as having
30:39
Speaker 1: been present that night. Not only does he say Mack
30:42
Speaker 1: was present, he says mac was using a walkie talkie.
30:46
Speaker 1: And hey, maybe that's all circumstantial evidence, but people get
30:50
Speaker 1: convicted over circumstantial evidence all the time. If you believe
30:54
Speaker 1: Scott Peterson killed his wife, you can find it in
30:57
Speaker 1: your heart to believe the LAPD was involved in the
31:00
Speaker 1: murder of Christopher Wallace. Have you ever looked into the
31:03
Speaker 1: Peterson case. There's zero actual evidence he killed his wife,
31:07
Speaker 1: just evidence that he went fishing the day she went missing.
31:11
Speaker 1: And then after like a month of the media drilling
31:14
Speaker 1: that detail into people's heads, Lacy Peterson's body is found
31:18
Speaker 1: in the water, and that's it. That's the evidence, and
31:22
Speaker 1: that dude is never getting out of prison. In this case,
31:26
Speaker 1: they found a shrine to tupac bullets that match the
31:30
Speaker 1: kind used to kill Notorious Big Walkie Talkies, and a
31:35
Speaker 1: car that's identical to the car the shooter was driving,
31:39
Speaker 1: all in the garage of a corrupt cop who worked
31:43
Speaker 1: for Notorious Bigg's biggest rival. In any other case, that
31:48
Speaker 1: person at least gets arrested and or asked a few questions,
31:53
Speaker 1: but none of that ever happened. Another detail in the
31:56
Speaker 1: movie that I don't think has been public knowledge to
32:00
Speaker 1: this point is that Pool at one point gets a
32:03
Speaker 1: copy of the official LAPD report about the murder of
32:07
Speaker 1: a crypt named Kelly Jamison. Kelly Jamison was jumped by
32:11
Speaker 1: a group of bloods at a Death Row after party
32:14
Speaker 1: and subsequently beaten to death, But in the report they
32:18
Speaker 1: receive about the incident through a Freedom of Information Act request,
32:23
Speaker 1: all of the details of that incident are redacted, even
32:27
Speaker 1: Kelly Jamison's name. And why because, as it turns out,
32:31
Speaker 1: the three Death Row security guards who watched the incident
32:34
Speaker 1: happen were off duty LAPD officers, So if that were
32:39
Speaker 1: to get out down the rabbit hole we go. If
32:41
Speaker 1: nothing else, it's solid evidence that the LAPD very much
32:46
Speaker 1: wanted to cover up their officer's involvement with death row records.
32:50
Speaker 1: Also side note, just because I have it at this
32:52
Speaker 1: point in my notes, the music in this movie is great.
32:56
Speaker 1: It's not just that they were able to license notorious
32:59
Speaker 1: Biggs action music, but there are some really cool remixes.
33:03
Speaker 1: If nothing else, this soundtrack deserves to be out anyway.
33:06
Speaker 1: The movie also mentions a thing that is confirmed to
33:11
Speaker 1: have happened that I think is the smoking gun in
33:16
Speaker 1: the LAPD's involvement in the murder of Christopher Wallace. The
33:20
Speaker 1: entire time David Mack was in prison for that bank robbery,
33:24
Speaker 1: which he was very cocky about by the way, because
33:27
Speaker 1: he's he's out of prison by now. Like he was
33:30
Speaker 1: sentenced to I think fifteen years good behavior, got out
33:33
Speaker 1: in like eight. Money was never recovered. The entire time
33:37
Speaker 1: David Mack was in prison, he got one visitor. That
33:40
Speaker 1: visitor was a Mere Mohammad, the man who was named
33:46
Speaker 1: by at least one source as the shooter in Christopher
33:49
Speaker 1: Wallace's death. That's pretty weird, right, Something that's not mentioned
33:53
Speaker 1: in the movie, but for sure has been mentioned in
33:56
Speaker 1: real life is that at one point someone claimed Rafael
33:59
Speaker 1: Perez set in jail, that the robbery was carried out
34:03
Speaker 1: to pay Amir Mohammad the other half of the money
34:07
Speaker 1: he was owed for the shooting. He didn't get all
34:09
Speaker 1: of the money he was owed because he was supposed
34:12
Speaker 1: to kill Puff Daddy too, but that opportunity passed when
34:15
Speaker 1: the car Puffy was riding in blew through that red light. Anyway,
34:19
Speaker 1: at this point, the movie has to take some creative
34:22
Speaker 1: liberties when covering the Rampart scandal, and I assume that's
34:26
Speaker 1: because Rampart could be an entire movie of its own.
34:30
Speaker 1: It is already a TV show of its own, The
34:33
Speaker 1: Shield starring Michael Chickliss. You ever seen it, It's based
34:36
Speaker 1: on the Rampart Scandal. Also, Denzel Washington's character in Training
34:41
Speaker 1: Day is based on the central figure in the Rampart scandal,
34:45
Speaker 1: who is the aforementioned LAPD officer Rafael Perez. The events
34:51
Speaker 1: leading up to the Rampart scandal are way more detailed
34:54
Speaker 1: and drawn out than depicted in this movie, but they
34:58
Speaker 1: get the important part right, which is as mentioned earlier,
35:02
Speaker 1: that it ended with Perez, who was also a blood
35:07
Speaker 1: who worked security for death row records implicating at least
35:10
Speaker 1: seventy LAPD officers in all sorts of crimes. The way
35:15
Speaker 1: Perez's eventual arrest is depicted in the film isn't what
35:19
Speaker 1: actually happened. What it is, though, is a composite of
35:23
Speaker 1: all the crimes Perez is known to have committed, including
35:27
Speaker 1: shooting an innocent man and then planning a gun on
35:31
Speaker 1: him to make it seem like he was attacked, stealing
35:36
Speaker 1: cocaine and then reselling it on the street. But in
35:40
Speaker 1: the movie, it's made to seem that what happens after
35:43
Speaker 1: his arrest is that Perez immediately agrees to implicate these
35:47
Speaker 1: other cops, and no, what happened is he went on
35:51
Speaker 1: trial for stealing cocaine from the LAPD evidence room that
35:56
Speaker 1: ended in a hung jury and a mistrial, and while
35:59
Speaker 1: the processcution was looking for more evidence to build a
36:03
Speaker 1: case for a second trial, they found eleven more instances
36:07
Speaker 1: of him stealing cocaine. So to avoid that second trial,
36:11
Speaker 1: he agrees to talk. And here's where the movie makes
36:15
Speaker 1: a really huge claim. What it implies is that the
36:19
Speaker 1: Ramparts scandal wasn't the LAPD finally coming clean about all
36:26
Speaker 1: of their wrongdoing. The Rampart scandal was a diversion that
36:30
Speaker 1: allowed them to take the bullet for a bunch of
36:32
Speaker 1: smaller crimes, but avoid the disastrous consequences that would have
36:37
Speaker 1: resulted from the murder of Christopher Wallace being tied to
36:41
Speaker 1: the LAPD. That's a huge claim, and it's one that
36:45
Speaker 1: I haven't seen mentioned in any of the subsequent articles
36:50
Speaker 1: or coverage of this theory. Another revelation from the movie.
36:54
Speaker 1: At one point, Russell Poole was going to testify on
36:57
Speaker 1: behalf of the defense in a cil the family of
37:01
Speaker 1: Kevin Gaines had filed against Frank Liga. The point was
37:05
Speaker 1: to get his allegations of LAPD involvement in the death
37:09
Speaker 1: of Christopher Wallace on the public record. Liga and his
37:13
Speaker 1: lawyer both were on board. But then the Chief of
37:16
Speaker 1: police shows up at the courthouse, a meeting of some
37:19
Speaker 1: sort happens, and the case ends up being settled without
37:24
Speaker 1: Liga's knowledge and without anyone ever being allowed to testify,
37:29
Speaker 1: And that case was definitely settled. Kevin Gaines's family I believe,
37:33
Speaker 1: got two hundred and fifty thousand dollars from the LAPD.
37:38
Speaker 1: So there's that, and that is what this movie is
37:41
Speaker 1: about at its core, not just the murder of Christopher Wallace,
37:46
Speaker 1: but more so and more importantly, about how every attempt
37:52
Speaker 1: at completely and fully investigating the LAPD's involvement in that
37:57
Speaker 1: murder is shut down every time. So basically it's a
38:01
Speaker 1: movie about what happened to this movie. How fucking meta
38:05
Speaker 1: is that? The movie also reveals another interesting detail at
38:09
Speaker 1: the end. At one point, after Russell Poole was pushed
38:12
Speaker 1: out of the LAPD and told his theory about David
38:16
Speaker 1: Mack was false, the LAPD reopened the investigation to avoid
38:21
Speaker 1: a civil suit, and did it by issuing a search
38:24
Speaker 1: warrant for David Maximpla. In other words, the same lead
38:28
Speaker 1: Russellpool brought them in the first place is what they
38:32
Speaker 1: used to justify that search warrant. So how invalid could
38:36
Speaker 1: the theory really be if that search warrant was issued?
38:40
Speaker 1: Nothing ever came of that search warrant, probably because that
38:44
Speaker 1: wasn't really the point. Issuing that search warrant meant they
38:47
Speaker 1: were still investigating and investigating a fellow cop no less,
38:52
Speaker 1: but also because it was an open investigation.
38:55
Speaker 2: The civil suit filed by Valletta, Wallace couldn't go forward.
38:58
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, Russell Opool died before he could do anything with
39:03
Speaker 1: that search warrant information. And if I recall correctly never
39:07
Speaker 1: mentioned in that USA Network series, imagine that. And unfortunately
39:12
Speaker 1: the movie ends as this story ends in real life,
39:16
Speaker 1: with no resolution. The murder of Christopher Wallace has never
39:20
Speaker 1: been solved. The murder of Tupac Shakur remains unsolved, despite
39:26
Speaker 1: so many people witnessing those murders with their own eyes.
39:31
Speaker 1: But yeah, City Allies is a great fucking movie. If
39:34
Speaker 1: you are able to find it, I would recommend giving
39:38
Speaker 1: it a watch. Be wary about doing what I did
39:41
Speaker 1: and buying a legitimate copy of it on Blu Ray
39:45
Speaker 1: and a whole other Blu ray player to watch it with.
39:48
Speaker 1: You're gonna have some outlet concerns. You're gonna have to
39:51
Speaker 1: be some adapters involved there. You might have to rewire
39:55
Speaker 1: your house and then all the text on the screen.
39:58
Speaker 1: It's in Italian. How am I supposed to know what
40:00
Speaker 1: Modjill one nine nine seven means?
40:03
Speaker 2: What am I?
40:04
Speaker 1: Rosetta Stone? But beyond that, really good movie. Highly recommended.
40:08
Speaker 1: Just don't ask me for a copy I will not
40:11
Speaker 1: give it to you. I don't have it anymore. Like
40:13
Speaker 1: I said, set it on fire anyway. That is the episode.
40:20
Speaker 1: Like I said, I'll be doing more episodes like this
40:22
Speaker 1: in the future. Most of them will probably be bonus episodes,
40:26
Speaker 1: but this one's free. As far as things to plug
40:29
Speaker 1: conspiracy dot Supercast, dot tech, you can subscribe to just
40:33
Speaker 1: this podcast and bonus episodes all add free for just
40:36
Speaker 1: three dollars a month, or unpopsnetwork, dot Supercast, dot Tech
40:41
Speaker 1: you can subscribe to the entire network through the end
40:44
Speaker 1: of the month for just five dollars, then it goes
40:46
Speaker 1: up the end of that month. Also, go to anchor
40:50
Speaker 1: dot fm slash Conspiracy the show and you can leave
40:54
Speaker 1: us a voicemail. I don't know if I'll included on
40:57
Speaker 1: the show, but I might as long as you're not
40:59
Speaker 1: a jerk about it. Follow this show on Twitter at
41:02
Speaker 1: Conspira pops and I think that's it.
41:05
Speaker 2: Let's get out of here. Goodbye everybody. I love you.