Waymond Anderson, an inmate at California's Corcoran state prison and a key witness in the ongoing investigation into the 1997 slaying of the Notorious B.I.G., has given a deposition rescinding earlier testimony implicating two Los Angeles police officers in the slaying.
Anderson, a former R&B singer serving time for a separate murder case, now insists his lies were part of a larger scam to cash in on a wrongful-death settlement from the city.
"It was a lie and I'm ashamed of it," Anderson said in his Aug. 20 deposition. "I did what I had to do to survive."
In the deposition, Anderson claimed that he only fingered LAPD officers Rafael Perez and David Mack—the latter of whom is also currently serving time in a federal prison for stealing nearly $750,000 from a bank—as complicit in Biggie's murder after Anderson was promised between 5 and 10 percent of a settlement sought by the family of the slain rapper.
The family of the Bad Boy star, whose real name was Christopher Wallace, have filed suit against the city of Los Angeles, alleging that the LAPD, in particular Mack, were responsible for the artist's death on March 9, 1997. The rapper's mother, Voletta Wallace, and his widow, singer Faith Evans, filed the suit back in 2002.
"I don't know David Mack, I don't know Rafael Perez," Anderson said in his deposition, adding that the officers "had no involvement with the...murder."
(Perez earned a degree of infamy, and a prison sentence, as the lead figure in Los Angeles' Rampart police scandal.)
Previously, Anderson testified to having had several conversations with both officers, claiming they were somehow involved in facilitating and covering up the murder. In his new deposition, he claims he was offered up to $150,000, by Voletta Wallace via an inmate intermediary, for his cooperation in testifying against the officers.
Anderson said he was first approached to take part in the scheme by a fellow inmate in 2001 and that he was one of three prisoners recruited to lie in the scam. Eventually, he claims, one of the family's lawyers, Perry R. Sanders Jr., contacted him by phone and confirmed the terms of the deal, parroting that he would come into a financial windfall if he testified.
Sanders, for his part, told the Los Angeles Times that the new deposition and allegations of city scamming, are "100 percent, demonstrably false. This is wholesale, made-up-out-of-whole-cloth perjury."
"It goes way beyond denial," he said of the accusations. "They're demonstrably false and defamatory."
SOURCE: E! News - www.eonline.com
Anderson, a former R&B singer serving time for a separate murder case, now insists his lies were part of a larger scam to cash in on a wrongful-death settlement from the city.
"It was a lie and I'm ashamed of it," Anderson said in his Aug. 20 deposition. "I did what I had to do to survive."
In the deposition, Anderson claimed that he only fingered LAPD officers Rafael Perez and David Mack—the latter of whom is also currently serving time in a federal prison for stealing nearly $750,000 from a bank—as complicit in Biggie's murder after Anderson was promised between 5 and 10 percent of a settlement sought by the family of the slain rapper.
The family of the Bad Boy star, whose real name was Christopher Wallace, have filed suit against the city of Los Angeles, alleging that the LAPD, in particular Mack, were responsible for the artist's death on March 9, 1997. The rapper's mother, Voletta Wallace, and his widow, singer Faith Evans, filed the suit back in 2002.
"I don't know David Mack, I don't know Rafael Perez," Anderson said in his deposition, adding that the officers "had no involvement with the...murder."
(Perez earned a degree of infamy, and a prison sentence, as the lead figure in Los Angeles' Rampart police scandal.)
Previously, Anderson testified to having had several conversations with both officers, claiming they were somehow involved in facilitating and covering up the murder. In his new deposition, he claims he was offered up to $150,000, by Voletta Wallace via an inmate intermediary, for his cooperation in testifying against the officers.
Anderson said he was first approached to take part in the scheme by a fellow inmate in 2001 and that he was one of three prisoners recruited to lie in the scam. Eventually, he claims, one of the family's lawyers, Perry R. Sanders Jr., contacted him by phone and confirmed the terms of the deal, parroting that he would come into a financial windfall if he testified.
Sanders, for his part, told the Los Angeles Times that the new deposition and allegations of city scamming, are "100 percent, demonstrably false. This is wholesale, made-up-out-of-whole-cloth perjury."
"It goes way beyond denial," he said of the accusations. "They're demonstrably false and defamatory."
SOURCE: E! News - www.eonline.com
