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When Keeping It Real Goes Wrong
Coverage Of Lil' Kim's Perjury Trial
XXL, July 2005
The code of the streets can carry a steep price. Four years after the gunflight that landed two members of her crew in the pen, Lil' Kim has been convicted of lying to protect them. But the question on everyone's lips is: What was she thinking?
The Media Circus: March 17, 2005
At 5 p.m., a mass of paparazzi and TV journalists choke the front entrance of the Thurgood Marshall Federal Courthouse at 40 Foley Square in Lower Manhattan. When their mark emerges, there’s a flurry of shouting and shutter flashes as she is sucked into a vortex of cameras, boom microphones and tape recorders, which dead-ended momentarily on a raised, snow-covered manhole cover on a private side street. Her handlers fight off the journalists and the hordes of fans—young gay men, mostly, passionate and vocal in their unwavering support. Armed US Marshals clear a path. “If you love Lil’ Kim,” her publicist implores, “Do not speak to the media!”
Moments earlier, in a plain, white-walled courtroom on the building’s fifth floor, a jury of her peers had found the diminutive rap star, along with a codefendent, her personal assistant Monique Dopwell, guilty of three counts of perjury counts and one of conspiracy. Ten years after debuting on Junior Mafia’s debut album (the retrospectively ill-titled Conspiracy); eight years after her mentor, the Notorious B.I.G., was murdered; having outshined the rest of her group, and achieved icon status in the worlds of fashion and cosmetic surgery, Lil’ Kim faces the prospect of 20 years in federal prison.
She showed little emotion as the verdicts were read. Standing straight, head thrown back, her impressive cleavage poking through her frilly blouse, her only movement was the flickering of her Tammy-Faye-Baker-like eyelashes. Her mother, though, Ruby Jones, sat nearby with her head in her lap, wailing inconsolably as Kim’s manager, Hillary Weston, wrapped her long arms around her. “It’s not about me,” Kim said to her mom, tying the case, as she had all along to the war against “hip-hop and the hip-hop industry.”
Whether or not Kim’s calm words were of any comfort to her mom, they didn’t advance anyone’s understanding of the trial’s central question. And it was about her: Why would a world-famous rap star, with so much to lose, gamble with her freedom against such impossible odds?
The Backstory: February 25, 2001
Kimberly Jones’ life changed on February 25, 2001. It was a sunny day on Hudson Street in the West Village. After appearing on DJ Clue’s Hot 97 radio show, she and her Junior Mafia associates came face-to-face with rapper Kiam “Capone” Holley and a group of his cohorts on the sidewalk outside the station. Enmity stemming from Foxy Brown’s guest verse on Capone-n-Noreaga’s “Bang, Bang,” on which Brown disparaged Kim and her crew, bubbled over. Six different guns were fired. Capone’s friend Efrain Ocasio was hit in the back and seriously injured. The street was full of fans and witnesses, and then, twenty-two empty shell casings.
Kim sped off in a limo. But police paid a visit to her home in Englewood, New Jersey that night, and soon arrested her associate Suif “C-Gutta” Jackson, and her manager, and former boyfriend and housemate, Damion “D-Roc” Butler. Because the guns used in the assault had crossed state lines to get there, the feds took jurisdiction. More than two years after the incident, Kim and Monique Dopwell were granted immunity for their grand jury testimony. Kim testified on June 19, July 3 and August 21 of 2003 that she was accompanied to the radio station by Dopwell and Antoine “Banger” Spain and James “Lil’ Cease” Lloyd. Butler, she said, was not present at any time, and she was unable to identify the mugshot of the other accused shooter, Jackson. Dopwell parroted Kim’s story.
On April 14, 2004 as part of The United States vs. Damion Butler, et al., Kim and Dopwell were indicted for perjury, obstruction of justice and conspiracy for allegedly lying about Butler’s whereabouts on February 25, 2001, and for claiming they didn’t recognize Jackson’s picture. Unlike her co-defendants Jackson and Butler who were represented under the Criminal Justice Act, the federal equivalent of legal aid, Kim retained Mel Sachs, a grandstanding New York attorney with a fashion sense reminiscent of The Joker from Batman. Sachs, whose clientele has included Russell Simmons, David Copperfield, Henny Youngman and Mike Tyson, even taught Sean Penn how to play a Manhattan lawyer for his role in “Carlito’s Way.”
Along with the publicity firm, 5WPR, Sachs immediately went to work on Kim’s image, holding a press conference at New York’s Bryant Park Hotel on August16, 2004. Kim’s statements to the Grand Jury, Sachs explained, had been “extracted out of context and magnified out of proportion.” No specific questions about the case were answered. “I am innocent,” Kim said, enunciating precisely as she read from a statement. “Throughout my life and throughout my career, I’ve been a survivor. This case is part of the government’s continued indictment against hip-hop and the hip-hop industry.” She also took the opportunity to introduce Royalty, her new watch line with Jacob “The Jeweler” Arabo and a charity, Lil’ Kim Cares.
But while Kim and Dopwell stuck to their story, the Feds knocked down their codefendants like dominoes. Surveillance cameras outside the station had filmed the gunfight and its participants clearly. Suif Jackson confessed on June 6, 2004, and was sentenced to 12 years in prison. Butler copped out on January 28, 2005, receiving a 10-year sentence. (Both men were already serving state sentences for a separate 2001 shooting in Brooklyn.) Even Lil’ Kim’s manager, Weston, who had been charged with passport fraud for helping Butler create false travel documents under the name Sean Conners, plea bargained her case down to a misdemeanor.
Still, two months before the trial was set to begin, Sachs sat in his office across from the Marshall courthouse, trumpeting the party line: “The charges against her have been extracted out of context and magnified out of proportion.”
Opening Statements: March 1, 2005
In their opening statement, the government prosecutors quickly outlined their strategy: They would prove that Lil’ Kim knew Butler was at Hot 97 on February 25, 2001, and that she was lying when she claimed she couldn’t identify Suif Jackson. Assistant United States Attorneys Dan Gitner—his Men’s Wearhouse suits a stark contrast to Sachs’ sartorial flair—and his colleague Cathy Seibel wasted no time. Their first witness, FBI Special Agent Brian Getson, told of a search he conducted at the offices of Kim’s company, Queen Bee Entertainment. He produced a $1,000 check written out to Suif Jackson, a travel ledger in the name of Butler’s company, Roc Management, and other evidence clearly linking Kim with the two men.
When it was Sachs’ turn, he addressed the court with theatrical oration. He painted his client as a young woman who’d overcome incredible odds, and, apparently, a really bad memory, to become a successful rap star. He described Kim as Junior Mafia’s breadwinner, a victim of her own kindness, who had eventually tired of her old friends’ troubled ways. “Two years before, she had severed her business and personal ties with Mr. Butler,” he said, slicing the air with his hands. “Why would she lie for someone who she had enough of at the time? It doesn’t make sense.” Then he introduced his hook, the refrain from which his defense would hang: “This is a case of window dressing,” he said, again gesticulating for emphasis.
Hillary Weston looked on impassively. Beside her was a well-worn bible, little tabs denoting selected passages, and her boyfriend, The Source magazine publisher Dave Mays.
Guns and Gutta: March 3, 2005
The prosecution subpoenaed Suif Jackson, granting him immunity for testimony they hoped would establish his relationship with Lil’ Kim was close enough to prove she was lying when she said she could not identify him in photographs. Jackson, who has appeared in music videos with Kim, and received thanks in the liner notes to two of her solo albums, took the stand wearing a blue, prison-issue uniform, and responded reluctantly when addressed. Nevertheless, Gitner got straight to work.
“How long have you known Kimberly Jones?”
“Approximately 10 years.”
“Between 1995 and 2002 or so, would you describe your relationship with Kimberly Jones as friendly?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t hear you.”
“Yes.”
“Did there come a time in early 2001 when you went to a radio station in Manhattan?”
“Yes.”
“Was that a day when Kimberly Jones and others were on the radio?”
“Yes.”
“Did you bring a weapon with you?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of weapon?”
“A Mac-11.”
“Was it fully automatic?”
“Yes.”
“Does that mean it was a machine gun?”
“Yes.”
“Where did you bring it from?”
“New Jersey.”
“What city in New Jersey?”
“Englewood.”
“Who lives there?”
“Kimberly Jones.”
Who You Calling a Snitch?: March 3, 2005
By the third day of trial, the courthouse seating pattern was established. Kim’s core group of supporters held the back two rows. From time to time over the course of the proceedings, working folks like Kevin Lyles, Dr. Benjamin Chavis and even Freddie Foxxx would show up and watch for a while, but most of Kim’s crowd was an interesting mix of overtly religious church folk and the flamboyantly gay black men who see Kim as their Madonna. Together, they made for a catty, voluble gallery, ohhing and ahhing and letting their opinions be known throughout the trial—this despite the tough-looking female Marshall frequently telling them to simmer down.
In this case, though, popular opinion was shaped on the radio, the World Wide Web, and on the streets, where Kim’s refusal to rollover for the Feds was boosting her standing— and making it very difficult for the others involved. Lil’ Cease, Banger, Capone and Capone’s former manager, James Cruz, had all been labeled snitches for agreeing to testify about the events that took place outside Hot 97.
Cease, the number one recipient of fan ire on www.lilkimzone.com, entered the courtroom to grumbles. He wore a black Notorious B.I.G. T-shirt, and carried a weary expression on his otherwise youthful face. He looked troubled on the stand, stroking his beard and shifting in his seat. But he answered Seibel’s questions politely, nodding along as she played the Junior Mafia song “Revolution,” where Kim sends a shout-out to Suif “Gutta” Jackson, and confirming that it was indeed Jackson thanked in the liner notes to Kim’s 1997 solo album, “Hard Core.”
After establishing the preliminary connections between Kim, Jackson and Butler, Seibel zeroed in on Feb. 21, 2001. “While you were out on the sidewalk,” she asked, “Kimberly Jones came out on the sidewalk?”
“Yes,” said Cease.
“Who was she with?”
“I don’t remember,” he said. But then, “She was with Damion Butler.”
One of Kim’s supporters blurted out: “Caught you!”
D-Roc Stands: March 3, 2005
Just after lunch, Damion Butler was brought in to the courtroom. Gitner asked him to stand up to demonstrate he was the very large man shown earlier, in a security-camera videotape, accompanying Kim and Junior Mafia to the station on Feb. 21, 2001. He had on a white T-shirt, a blue V-neck jail shirt, no belt to belt to hold up his saggy chinos, and black Converse Chucks with no laces. He looked at Kim with sad eyes and silently shook his head.
Banger Talks: March 7, 2005
On a bench in the hallway, a strange sight: Banger and Capone, talking quietly as they awaited their testimony. On opposing sides of the gun battle in 2001, they were both here now as witnesses for the prosecution. Their peaceful conversation—presumably about how a federal courthouse was the last place in the world they wanted to be—was a reminder of how far this has all come.
Later in the day, Banger took the stand with a scowl on his face. He was openly disdainful during Gitner’s examination, answering some questions only after having them repeated and refusing, at times, to make eye contact. Still, Gitner got the story he needed.
“Who else got in the limo and went from 23 Old Quarry to the radio station with you?”
“Me, Kim, Mo, Cease.”
“Once you got there, who did you meet?”
“Met Roc.”
“Where?”
“Met Roc, he escorted us into the building...”
“What happened after you met Roc?”
“We went upstairs and did the interview.”
“Who went upstairs?”
“Me, Cease, Roc, Kim, Mo.”
“And how did you get upstairs?”
“By elevator.”
The Dog and Pony Show: March 10, 2005
After a long weekend and several days taken up by the reenactment of Kim and Dopwell’s Grand Jury testimony, the prosecution finally rested its case. Sachs, resplendent in a wide-lapelled suit, matching bow tie and pocket square, took center stage to present his defense. From the outset, he went to great lengths to elicit sympathy for Lil’ Kim; to show her as a normal person, with a life that’s really not that different from that of the men and women of the jury, caught up in circumstances beyond her control. Hillary Weston’s assistant Gene Nelson was his first witness, speaking on the day-to-day goings-on of the music industry.
“What goes into making videos?” Sachs asked.
“A lot of work,” Nelson said, in a tone as folksy as Andy Griffith.
The jury laughed out loud. Sachs followed with: “Do artists write their own shout-outs?”
“They don’t pay attention to that,” Nelson said. “It’s the most minute detail.”
Sachs thanked him and sat down. Gitner stood and approached Nelson for the cross-examination. Question after question, parsing his words, going over his account. “By the way,” Gitner said, nonchalantly, “did someone tell you to say that thank-you's come not just from the artist, but from the staff and the artist?”
La Bella Mafia: March 10, 2005
When Sachs called Kim, there was a collective gasp in the courtroom worthy of a Matlock episode. Wearing a salmon colored skirt and jacket, Kim told her life story, sounding surprised by her success and overwhelmed by the responsibility it’s brought. She was like a smitten schoolgirl as she remembered Biggie, sounded disappointed when discussing a Phil Collins video shoot where Butler caused a fight, and oozed compassion while describing her charity work. She recalled her days working for HR Block and Bloomingdales, and told of a trip to Japan. “It’s one of my favorite places to go,” she said, with a cutesy giggle, “because all of the clothes fit me.”
When she recounted February 25, 2001, she turned to the jury: “I am sure if any of you were in a shootout, you wouldn’t know how to recall.”
Sachs asked her how she felt during her Grand Jury appearances. “I... I felt badgered,” she stammered. “Almost the same way he was with Gene today.” As the jurors left for lunch, Kim made eye contact with them again. This time Gitner objected.
After the lunch break, Seibel got up and walked across the floor. In black slacks, and a jacket flecked with pink, purple, and yellow, she looked more like a high-school science teacher than an intimidating prosecutor. But she had more damning evidence at her disposal. It didn’t take long for her to unhinge Kim.
“Good afternoon, Ms. Jones,” she said.
“Good afternoon.”
“Can you look at the monitor? That’s Damion Butler holding the door for James Lloyd and yourself, correct?
“Yes.”
“And for the record, that was 51B. Now I’ll show you 52G. That’s a photograph of Damion Butler firing a weapon on the sidewalk in front of Hot 97, correct?”
“Yeah, that looks like Damion. That’s Damion.”
“Showing you 52B, that’s a photograph of you standing right behind Damion Butler, correct?”
“I can’t see that well, but I think that’s me right there.”
“And this photograph was taken at 2:13:31. And less than half a minute later, Damion Butler was firing a weapon, correct?”
“I can’t see if that’s a weapon in his hand. But I guess so, yeah.”
Seibel pressed her about Exhibits J3 and T4, two photos of Suif Jackson that she failed to identify in her three grand jury appearances. T4 was a mug shot with “S. Jackson” printed on the bottom.
“You were asked a lot of questions about the person in J3, correct?” Seibel asked.
“A lot of questions about this person, yeah.”
“And one of them was, ‘Do you know his name?’ And you told the grand jury, ‘No.’ Correct?”
“Yeah, I’m judging by me not being able to recognize the photo.”
“But you recognized the photo clearly enough that you recognized that the individual in T4 was the same guy?”
“Well, at the same time I was thinking it could be Suif Jackson, but I wasn’t sure, because when I looked over the paper I saw the name and said: Well, it could be Ty, it could be Drag-On. I wasn’t really sure and I couldn’t make a positive identity.”
“Did you see it well enough to recognize that the person in J3 was the same person in the photograph that has S. Jackson written on it?”
“I said, ‘Yeah, it looks like the guy you showed me in J3.’”
“So the answer is yes?”
Seibel examined Kim’s business interests. She asked about her back taxes and why she had yet to make a dent in the million dollars she owed the IRS. Kim was hazy on the details despite the fact that she’d signed the documents. “I take the lead from Hillary,” Kim said. “I take the lead from my accountant. Whatever they want me to sign, I sign.”
“You’ve got to have a little something upstairs,” Seibel retorted.
“This is ridiculous,” one of Kim’s supporters said, shaking her head. “This is not related to the case,” said a man wearing the name of his organization, “Hugs for Harlem,” on his chest. “This is not righteous.” The jurors began to look sympathetic. The next day, the New York Times would report that Seibel “appeared to overplay her hand at times.”
“You mentioned yesterday,” Seibel continued. “You were a victim of a shootout?
“Yes, I was.”
“And you could have been killed?”
“Yes, I could have been killed.”
“Or you could have been injured like the man who got shot?”
“Yes.”
“As a victim, naturally, you called the police at your first opportunity, correct?”
“No, I did not.”
“Somebody in the limo had a cell phone, correct?”
“Yeah.”
“You didn’t use the cell phone to call the police?”
“No, I did not. It was very traumatic time for me. I mean—”
“Ma’am, the question was, did you use the phone to call the police?”
“No, I did not.”
“As a victim you certainly wanted to be as helpful as you could in finding out who did this?”
“At that time, I’m just thinking, you know, my family, my mother. I’m thinking about Mo’s kids. I’m just thinking—a lot of times when traumatic moments happen in my life, like, I just shut down. I don’t know how you would handle it, or anyone else, but I just shut down.”
“As a victim, you certainly want the police investigation to be as successful as possible to try to find the people who victimized you, right?”
“I can’t really answer that, because I’m the type of person, if something like that happens in my life and—as you know, if you’re reading up on me, there has been a lot of things that happened in my life. I just shut down and keep on moving. I don’t dwell on my past. A lot of things can’t be figured out. A lot of things don’t get figured out, like Biggie’s death. I just keep on moving. That was very traumatic for me.”
“Some things can be figured out?”
“I guess so.”
“In this case, it was figured out that Damion Butler and Suif Jackson shot guns on this day, right?”
“I guess so.”
“And—”
“This is a very serious situation. I would not come into a grand jury and purposely just tell false statements and lie. No, I wouldn’t do that.”
Closing Arguments: March 13, 2005
Seibel was calm and plainspoken as she presented her closing arguments. She described the event of March 25, 2001 as “a Wild West shootout on a Manhattan sidewalk,” saying, “Kimberly Jones and Monique Dopwell simply left Damion Butler out of the story.”
Seibel finished and gave Sachs the floor. Sporting his best blue power suit, his hair immaculately coifed, he spoke slowly. He stood over a podium addressing the jurors from a script where the words where written out in large text. He hit the same notes as his opening. “She’d already severed the relationship with Damion Butler and Suif Jackson,” he said, again, slicing the air crossways. “She’d had it.”
Then he took ‘em room to church. Summarizing Kim’s hard knock life, he ended every anecdote with “she moves on in her life…” In the back, supporters huzzahed. “You’re allowed in America to have a bad memory,” he said, passionately. “You’re allowed to make a mistake. Thank god we live in a country that allows you to decide!”
After he rested his defense, Sachs, who is known for trying his cases in the media, spoke confidently about his performance with reporters outside of the courtroom. “I think I was really able to really bring out what this trial was all about,” he said. “You can’t just contradict. You have to show what’s behind it.”
The Verdict: March 17, 2005
After the verdict was read, Judge Gerard Lynch looked at right at Kim. “The other provision I want to call attention to is the provision for acceptance of responsibility,” he said. “It is never too late to obtain that credit.” He was offering Kim a chance for leniency in sentencing if she would just admit her guilt. Kim sat motionless, though, and remained silent.
Epilogue: March 23, 2005
Kim’s decision to take the case to trial seems, in hindsight, like a scene from the Dave Chappelle sketch, When Keeping It Real Goes Wrong. She kept the code of the streets: she didn’t rat. But why hold out even after her codefendants – the men who she would have been ostensibly lying to protect – had confessed?
In hip-hop circles, Kim has been lionized while Banger and Cease have been painted as snitches. Enterprising MCs have even appeared on Kayslay’s Hot 97 show to make their name dissing Junior Mafia. But a couple of weeks after the verdict, Cease and Banger don’t seem bothered during lunch at a Jamaican spot in Chelsea. “I can walk down any block and people stop in their tracks,” Cease says, over his oxtail stew. “If a nigga is a teller he can’t be out. He fears for his life. I don’t fear for that, ’cause I know in my heart what I really did. And real people know what it is.”
Banger and Cease are preparing a song, “I’m From the Streets,” to tell their side of the story. If Kim had only spoken to them prior to the trial, they say, things could have been different. They could have testified for her. “Any day, Kim could have picked up the phone and hollered at us,” Cease says. “We tried to holla at Kim plenty of times.”
Really, they question her decision to take the case to trial. “I blame it on the people around her,” Banger says, “’cause if she would have communicated with us, I don’t think shorty would have lost that case. I don’t think she would have even had that case. We would have stood her in the right direction like, ‘Look shorty, this is what it is. Keep it funky with them. This is the Feds, this is the government. This is like the United States versus you, you’re not gonna win!’”
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