New film reveals detective's findings in murders of Tupac and Notorious BIG
Ben Westhoff
Murder Rap examines the killings of the two revered rappers within six months of each other in 1996-97, one of the most tangled mysteries in music
Tupac Shakur (left) and Notorious BIG. Photograph: Alamy & Corbis
@Ben_Westhoff
Wed 27 Jan 2016 12.27 EST
In 2006, Los Angeles police detective Greg Kading began investigating the murders of Tupac and the Notorious BIG, later leading a federalized taskforce hoping to solve those cold cases. Their finding were shocking:
A Compton Crip gang member named Orlando Anderson killed Tupac, they determined. The taskforce's key witness was Anderson's uncle, known as Keffe D. He claimed to be riding in the white Cadillac when Tupac was gunned down, and said Sean "Diddy" Combs offered their party $500,000 to kill Tupac, and the same amount to kill Suge Knight (but never paid them).
A Mob Piru Blood gang member named Wardell "Poochie" Fouse killed Biggie, they found, and was paid $13,000 by Death Row Records mogul Suge Knight for the task. The key witness this time was the mother of one of Suge's children, whom Kading calls Theresa Swann, to protect her anonymity.
Diddy has denied involvement in Tupac's murder. Knight, currently in jail on a separate murder charge, could not be reached for comment. He has not spoken publicly on Kading's findings. Both Anderson and Poochie have since been murdered, in unrelated incidents.
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In 2009, before Kading's team could finish building their cases, Kading was removed from the taskforce, owing to an internal affairs investigation relating to a separate case. He was exonerated, but soon after retired from the department, and the taskforce was dismantled. In 2011, Kading released their findings in a self-published book, called Murder Rap, which has now been made into a Michael Dorsey-directed documentary of the same name, out on iTunes on 2 February. I spoke with Kading about the cases and the film.
Concerning Diddy's alleged involvement in the Tupac murder, it's basically his word against Keffe D's, right?
Yes, although Diddy had previously alluded to wanting Suge and Tupac murdered in front of a group of people. So we can't corroborate that. But when we see that everything else Keffe D told us is corroborated, it then lends credibility to that issue.
Despite reports to the contrary, there's no evidence tying Biggie to Tupac's murder, right?
Yes, we have absolutely nothing to support the idea that he knew about it or acquiesced to it. Certainly, after the fact it would be reasonable to assume he found out about it, but I don't have any reason to believe he knew beforehand.
Suge Knight, who was sitting next to Tupac in the car when he was murdered in Las Vegas, said he was shot in the head during the incident. But other reports say he was just grazed. What's the truth?
You're playing with words. You're not actually lying, but you're misleading. If you get a piece of shrapnel lodged in the base of your skull, whether it's a piece of metal from flying debris inside of a car, or a fragment of a bullet, well, then you've been shot in the head. But that's different than having a bullet travel directly at you and strike you. He certainly did suffer a wound in the back of his head. He was treated for it. Supposedly there's a piece of metal that's lodged at the base of his skull, and they decided, better leave it alone rather than doing invasive surgery and perhaps doing more damage. He was struck by something; whether it's a bullet fragment or a piece of metal from the door, we'll never know.
Just about everyone believes Orlando Anderson murdered Tupac. So, why wasn't he convicted before he died?
It was difficult for the Las Vegas police department, because their suspects were in Compton and they were a bit disconnected. But Compton police went out of their way to provide information. They did search warrants and raids in Compton shortly after Tupac's murder, and Las Vegas police were out there, to see what evidence they might come up with at the location Orlando was arrested at. But they only had circumstantial evidence. They didn't have anyone identifying him as the shooter, and they had to work within the boundaries of the law. All they had was him on the videotape being beat down by Tupac and others [at the MGM Grand, shortly before Tupac's shooting]. So, you have the motive, but you can't place him at the scene of the crime.
Do you think Knight ordered Biggie's murder in retaliation for Tupac's murder? Was it as simple as that?
Well, it was an evolution of events. It's really not simple in the sense that there's all this stuff going on, on different levels. There's the Suge Knight/Sean Combs conflict. There's the Tupac/Biggie conflict. There's the Crips/Bloods conflict. But, the idea that this group killed this group because of an ongoing set of circumstances: yeah, it's that simple. It's complicatedly simple.
Former LAPD investigator Russell Poole believed crooked cops were behind Biggie's murder, and that a Nation of Islam member named Amir Muhammad pulled the trigger. Murder Rap sets out to debunk this, but one detail remains hard to reconcile: witnesses described Biggie's shooter as wearing a traditional Nation of Islam suit and bowtie. What do you make of that?
That's always been an area that has not been completely resolved. Since the taskforce was disbanded, we were never able to know if possibly Poochie was a member of the [Nation of Islam paramilitary arm] Fruit of Islam. But we do know that in Los Angeles at this time, gang members were dressing up as Nation of Islam in home invasion robberies and shootings.
What's new in the Murder Rap documentary that wasn't in the book?
On one of the latter pages of the book, there was a reference to [the car with Biggie's shooter] being a black Impala, which was an editing error. It should have said a green Impala. In the documentary, we corrected it. We knew Poochie had a car matching that description, and that, reportedly, he received it from Knight when he ordered two custom Chevrolets. We knew Suge's Impala was a custom color also – black cherry. We tracked the purchase of the green Impala back to a Chevy dealership in Phoenix, Arizona. We got that far. But by the time we discovered this information in 2009, those records no longer existed for us to get a paper trail back to 1995 or 1996 when the car was ordered.
You've said LAPD brass shut down your taskforce. Is there one person in particular who was responsible?
One of the main influences in disbanding the taskforce and making the decision not to do anything else was a guy named Gerry Chaleff. He was a defense attorney. He was never a cop but found himself in the hierarchy of the LAPD … I'm not saying it was his decision alone but he was very instrumental in the decision not to continue with the case. [A request to LAPD for comment from Chaleff was not returned.]
Since retiring from the force, what are you doing these days?
I'm all over the map. I own my own private investigation firm: I do murder investigation, missing person investigation and I stay relatively busy with that. I'm also involved in working toward telling the story of Death Row Records, through book and film projects.
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