Incarcerated Witness Says He Lied About LAPD Link To Notorious B.I.G. Murder
Published: Wednesday - September 26, 2007
Words by Ronnie Gamble
Notorious B.I.G. Photo: Bad Boy
The wrongful death suit of slain rapper Notorious B.I.G. just got a little more complicated recently, when a prison inmate who had implicated a former Los Angeles Police Department officer in the shooting of the rapper renounced his story, making the unsolved case even that more of a mystery.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Waymond Anderson, who is serving a life term for murder, said in a recent deposition that he lied about LAPD involvement in the Notorious B.I.G. murder as part of a "scam" to benefit from large monetary settlement out of the city.
That's not all either. He also accused the rapper's family and its lawyer of participating in the scheme and offering to pay him for false testimony implicating the LAPD.
He said he had been offered a percentage of any settlement received if he testified that former Los Angeles Officer, Rafael Perez, had told him that another ex-officer, David Mack, was involved in the murder.
"I don't know David Mack, I don't know Rafael Perez," Anderson said to lawyers representing relatives of the slain rapper, according to the paper.
He also said he was asked to lie in court about both former officers by the family's lawyer, Perry R. Sanders Jr., who calls the notion "100%, demonstrably false."
"This is wholesale, made-up-out-of-whole-cloth perjury," Sanders responded in an interview, said the paper.
Sanders disputed Anderson's accusations, claiming he was acting in support of Times reporter, Chuck Philips, who has written extensively about the Biggie murder, including articles that raised questions about the theory that LAPD officers were involved.
The Times reports that Philips had an article published earlier this year in the Times that cast doubt on Anderson's conviction in a 1993 arson-murder. Following the article, Anderson filed a writ of habeas corpus seeking his release.
Sanders said Anderson "clearly would like to please Mr. Philips, because he's singing his song, first, second and third verse and certainly the chorus."
Phillips called Sanders' theory "idiotic." "This guy clearly doesn't understand what an investigative reporter does for a living," he said. "I don't make up stories, I report them."
Notorious B.I.G. (real name: Christopher Wallace) rose to fame as the flagship artist for Diddy's Bad Boy Records. He was gunned down during a drive-by shooting in Los Angeles, shortly after leaving a music industry party in March of 1997. He was only 24 years of age.
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