Biggie's Killer....Are we any closer to finding them?
The search for the killer of the late Christopher Wallace better known to fans (including and especially me) as the Notorious B.I.G. goes on. It gets no better that a key eyewitness and former FBI informant Kevin Hackie recanted his testimony, thus dealing a huge setback to Biggie's mother Voletta Wallace and his ex-wife Faith Evans. He also denied remarks that he made in a June 2004 declaration prepared by the plaintiffs' attorneys including the assertion that former police officer David who wore the same red suits as Suge Knight, apparently pledging his allegience to the the Piru Bloods street gang.
For eight years, the mystery of who gunned down Notorious B.I.G. — and why — has frustrated and fascinated the hip-hop world and fueled media interest. With FBI and police investigations failing to net even a suspect, numerous theories implicated corrupt cops, gang hits, bicoastal beefs — or all three at once. None have been provable, so far.
A party Biggie attended at the Petersen Automotive Museum after the "Soul Train" music awards March 8th, 1997 was shut down due to over crowding. Bigge and Puffy were in a convoy of SUVs that left the are. Biggie, Lil Cease, and others were in one Suburban, Puffy and his entourage in others were in another. As they came to a red light about a few hundred feet away, a dark-colored late model Chevy Impala pulled alongside the SUV Biggie was in and fired 7 shots into the passenger door of the truck. The dirve-by shooter sped away and Biggie was rushed to Cedars-Sinai hospital a mile away from the scene. At 1:15 A.M. March 9th 1997, Christopher Wallace, The Notorious B.I.G. was pronounced dead. He was 24 years old.
The lawsuit claims LAPD officials covered up Mack's involvement in the slaying and ignored a systemic problem of potentially dangerous moonlighting. The family claims a number of off-duty officers associated with gang members while providing security for Death Row Records, home of Wallace's West Coast rival, Tupac Shakur.
Shakur was slain on the Las Vegas Strip in 1996 — six months before Wallace was killed, and the two are forever linked in hip-hop culture.
In Wednesday's testimony, Hackie said that Death Row security chief Reginald Wright wanted to retaliate against B.I.G. following the slaying of the label's star, Shakur. Hackie was an FBI informant while serving as Shakur's bodyguard for three years.
Hackie testified that Wright told him after Shakur was killed, "We were going to get those (people) who downed 'Pac — Biggie and his crew."
Hackie also said he saw Mack at numerous Death Row events, sometimes speaking with the record label's leader, Marion "Suge" Knight. But under cross-examination Hackie acknowledged that he only saw the officer with Knight and associates at large parties or "social functions."
Both Mack and the alleged shooter, Amir Muhammad, have been dropped from the family's lawsuit and have never been named as criminal suspects.
When Hackie took the stand, he explained that he didn't want to be in court because "this is all going to be on the 6 o'clock news" and he feared "retribution by the Bloods, the Los Angeles Police Department and associates of Death Row Records."
Attorneys in the case have said several witnesses are refusing to appear because they feared retaliation.
For eight years, the mystery of who gunned down Notorious B.I.G. — and why — has frustrated and fascinated the hip-hop world and fueled media interest. With FBI and police investigations failing to net even a suspect, numerous theories implicated corrupt cops, gang hits, bicoastal beefs — or all three at once. None have been provable, so far.
A party Biggie attended at the Petersen Automotive Museum after the "Soul Train" music awards March 8th, 1997 was shut down due to over crowding. Bigge and Puffy were in a convoy of SUVs that left the are. Biggie, Lil Cease, and others were in one Suburban, Puffy and his entourage in others were in another. As they came to a red light about a few hundred feet away, a dark-colored late model Chevy Impala pulled alongside the SUV Biggie was in and fired 7 shots into the passenger door of the truck. The dirve-by shooter sped away and Biggie was rushed to Cedars-Sinai hospital a mile away from the scene. At 1:15 A.M. March 9th 1997, Christopher Wallace, The Notorious B.I.G. was pronounced dead. He was 24 years old.
The lawsuit claims LAPD officials covered up Mack's involvement in the slaying and ignored a systemic problem of potentially dangerous moonlighting. The family claims a number of off-duty officers associated with gang members while providing security for Death Row Records, home of Wallace's West Coast rival, Tupac Shakur.
Shakur was slain on the Las Vegas Strip in 1996 — six months before Wallace was killed, and the two are forever linked in hip-hop culture.
In Wednesday's testimony, Hackie said that Death Row security chief Reginald Wright wanted to retaliate against B.I.G. following the slaying of the label's star, Shakur. Hackie was an FBI informant while serving as Shakur's bodyguard for three years.
Hackie testified that Wright told him after Shakur was killed, "We were going to get those (people) who downed 'Pac — Biggie and his crew."
Hackie also said he saw Mack at numerous Death Row events, sometimes speaking with the record label's leader, Marion "Suge" Knight. But under cross-examination Hackie acknowledged that he only saw the officer with Knight and associates at large parties or "social functions."
Both Mack and the alleged shooter, Amir Muhammad, have been dropped from the family's lawsuit and have never been named as criminal suspects.
When Hackie took the stand, he explained that he didn't want to be in court because "this is all going to be on the 6 o'clock news" and he feared "retribution by the Bloods, the Los Angeles Police Department and associates of Death Row Records."
Attorneys in the case have said several witnesses are refusing to appear because they feared retaliation.
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