Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 5:01pm
NEW YORK (AP) — Actor Michael K. Williams died of acute drug intoxication in what New York City’s medical examiner said Friday was an accidental death.
Williams, known for playing Omar Little on “The Wire” and an Emmy Award nominee this year, had fentanyl, parafluorofentanyl, heroin and cocaine in his system when he died Sept. 6 in Brooklyn.
Williams, 54, was found dead by family members in his penthouse apartment. Police said at the time that they suspected a drug overdose.
The city’s Office of Chief Medical Examiner said it would not comment further. A message seeking comment was left with Williams’ representative.
Williams had spoken frankly in interviews in recent years about his struggle with drug addiction, which he said persisted after he gained fame on “The Wire” in the early 2000s.
“I was playing with fire,” he told the Newark Star-Ledger in 2012. “It was just a matter of time before I got caught and my business ended up on the cover of a tabloid or I went to jail or, worse, I ended up dead. When I look back on it now, I don’t know how I didn’t end up in a body bag.”
New York Police Commissioner Dermot Shea said in an interview shortly after Williams’ death that he had spoken with the actor earlier this year about collaborating with the department on community outreach.
Williams had been working with a New Jersey charity to smooth the journey for former prison inmates seeking to reenter society, and was working on a documentary on the subject. Another project involved reaching out directly to at-risk youth.
“This Hollywood thing that you see me in, I’m passing through,” Williams told the Associated Press last year. “Because I believe this is where my passion, my purpose is supposed to be.”
Omar, a rogue robber of drug dealers based on real figures from Baltimore, was hugely popular among fans of “The Wire,” which ran on HBO from 2002 to 2008.
Williams also starred as Chalky White in HBO’s “Boardwalk Empire” from 2010 to 2014 and had roles in the films “12 Years a Slave” and “Assassin’s Creed.”
Williams was nominated this year for an Emmy for supporting actor in a drama series for HBO’s “Lovecraft Country,” but lost Sunday to a star of “The Crown.”
Williams was remembered in the ceremony’s “In Memoriam” segment.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 4:41pm
21 Savage turned himself in to the DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office on two charges and was quickly released on bond earlier this week, as BuzzFeed News reports. Online DeKalb County Jail records show that 21 Savage was booked at 7:48 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday night and released on bond just 12 minutes later. The listed charges are: possession of a Schedule II controlled substance and possession of a gun.
According to the online records, the alleged offenses occurred on February 2, 2019. Notably, on February 3, 2019, 21 Savage, who was born Shéyaa Bin Abraham-Joseph, was taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials. At the time, an ICE spokesman said that 21 Savage was an “unlawfully present United Kingdom national” who legally entered the United States in 2005 but overstayed his nonimmigrant visa, which expired in 2006. 21 Savage was released from custody 10 days after his arrest, and later said he was “definitely targeted” by officials.
A press release from 21 Savage’s representatives notes that the warrant for 21 Savage’s arrest was issued by the Dekalb County Police two weeks ago. “The warrant appears to have been sought at the behest of ICE,” it’s claimed in the press release. According to BuzzFeed News, the warrant alleges that 21 Savage “threw out a bottle that had liquid in it that later tested positive for codeine, and that a handgun was found inside the car” on the night of the 2019 ICE arrest.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 2:23pm
UFC star Jon Jones was arrested early Friday morning in Las Vegas for domestic violence and tampering with a vehicle, and is currently behind bars, TMZ Sports has learned.
Our law enforcement sources tell us they received a call from Caesars Palace around 5:45 AM. Cops responded to the hotel ... where they made contact with the UFC superstar.
34-year-old Jones was ultimately arrested for misdemeanor domestic violence and injuring or tampering with a vehicle, a felony.
Jones is in Vegas this week because his 2013 fight against Alexander Gustafsson is being inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame.
It's not the first time Jones has been in trouble with the law. He's previously been arrested for DUI, among other crimes.
The circumstances that led to the arrest are not yet clear.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 12:44pm
Universal Music is on the verge of commemorating the 30th anniversary of Nirvana's "Nevermind" with several multi-format reissues ... but the grown-up baby on the iconic album cover has one message -- don't use the damn genitalia pic!!!
Spencer Elden -- the man who was the naked baby pictured in a swimming pool on Nirvana's 1991 iconic album cover -- has already sued over the image. His lawyer, Maggie Mabie, tells TMZ ... she's demanding Universal redact the image of Elden's genitalia from all future album covers.
What's more ... Mabie says it's time to "end this child exploitation and violation of privacy." She says every year, during the anniversary of the release of "Nevermind" ... Elden has to brace himself for renewed, unwanted attention from the media and fans alike.
She says with the 30th anniversary of the album release slated for Friday, Elden's once again fears he'll be subjected to public scorn and ridicule.
Then there's this ... Universal is planning to release several multi-format reissues beginning November 12. There will be a total of 94 audio and video tracks -- including 70 previously unreleased -- made available in digital, CD and single-disc vinyl with a bonus 7-inch. The reissues have all been digitally remastered. The video tracks are CD and Blu-ray.
That's all fine and dandy ... but Elden wants Universal to quit using the famous naked baby on future album covers.
TMZ broke the story ... Elden sued the band, its surviving members and Kurt Cobain's estate to get them to end what he claims is child sexual exploitation.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 12:10pm
Jennifer Hough -- the attempted rape victim of Nicki Minaj's husband, Kenneth Petty -- says she's been bombarded with hate-filled messages from Nicki's fans ever since giving her first on-camera interview about her lawsuit against the couple.
Hough's getting a flurry of disturbing direct messages and some threats ... according to her attorney, Tyrone Blackburn. He tells TMZ it all started immediately after Jennifer went on "The Real" earlier this week.
We've obtained some of the DMs sent to Jennifer, which include inflammatory insults, someone wishing death upon her, and we're told there was also a concerning tweet in which someone shared her personal contact information.
Blackburn says the scary response from Nicki's fans reinforces what Jennifer expressed in her 'Real' interview -- she's had to live her life in constant fear for years, change her phone, move and quit jobs ... all because of her connection to Petty.
If you aren't familiar, Jennifer was the victim in Petty's 1995 conviction for first-degree attempted rape in NY -- which is why he has to register as a sex offender. You may recall, Petty was charged with not registering in California, and recently took a plea deal.
In August, Hough sued Nicki and Kenneth for allegedly harassing and threatening her to not speak about the incident. On a more positive note, Blackburn says Jennifer's TV appearance has inspired other women to tell their own stories, and they've reached out to say they're standing behind her.
We're told in the past 24 hours, Blackburn's received messages from 30 different women expressing their support for Jennifer and thanking her for her bravery.
1. Brodie Lee 2. End How You Start ft. AA Rashid 3. Hell On Earth Part 2 ft. Benny the Butcher & Conway the Machine 4. Free Kutter ft. Jay Electronica 5. Richie’s 6. Julia Lang ft. Trap-A-Holics 7. Celine Dion ft. Chase Fetti, Flee Lord & Heem 8. Best Dressed Demons ft. Mach-Hommy 9. Forest Lawn ft. 2 Chainz & Armani Caesar 10. Why I Do Em Like That ft. Billie Essco & Keisha Plum 11. RIP Bergdorf ft. Mach-Hommy 12. TV Boy 13. Survivor Series 95 ft. Jay Worthy, Larry June & TF 14. Eddie Kingston ft. Rome Streetz 15. Ostertag ft. Stove God Cooks 16. Munch ft. Tiona Deniece 17. 99 Avirex ft. AZ & Stove God Cooks 18. The Fly Who Couldn’t Fly Straight ft. Tyler, The Creator 19. Big AL ft. Rome Streetz 20. BYE BYE ft. Keisha Plum
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 9:03am
Check out NBA YoungBoy's new album, "Sincerely, Kentrell."
Tracklist:
01. Bad Morning 02. Hold Me Down 03. On My Side 04. Smoke Strong 05. 50 Shots 06. No Where 07. Sincerely 08. I Can't Take It Back 09. Rich Shit 10. Toxic Punk 11. My Killa 12. Life Support 13. Break Or Make Me 14. Forgiato 15. Baddest Thing 16. Nevada 17. Level I Want To Reach 18. Kickstand 19. All I Need 20. White Teeth 21. Panoramic
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 8:55am
Westside Gunn drops "Hitler Wears Hermes 8: Side B." Stream it up top.
Tracklist
1. Brodie Lee 2. End How You Start ft. AA Rashid 3. Hell On Earth Part 2 ft. Benny the Butcher & Conway the Machine 4. Free Kutter ft. Jay Electronica 5. Richie’s 6. Julia Lang ft. Trap-A-Holics 7. Celine Dion ft. Chase Fetti, Flee Lord & Heem 8. Best Dressed Demons ft. Mach-Hommy 9. Forest Lawn ft. 2 Chainz & Armani Caesar 10. Why I Do Em Like That ft. Billie Essco & Keisha Plum 11. RIP Bergdorf ft. Mach-Hommy 12. TV Boy 13. Survivor Series 95 ft. Jay Worthy, Larry June & TF 14. Eddie Kingston ft. Rome Streetz 15. Ostertag ft. Stove God Cooks 16. Munch ft. Tiona Deniece 17. 99 Avirex ft. AZ & Stove God Cooks 18. The Fly Who Couldn’t Fly Straight ft. Tyler, The Creator 19. Big AL ft. Rome Streetz 20. BYE BYE ft. Keisha Plum
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 7:50am
"The Most High" is the brand new album from UFO Fev co-starring his frequent collaborator Red Inf. The 10-track project features Ace Arty, K Like the Letter, MAV, Sauce Heist and Asun Eastwood.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 24, 2021 at 1:30am
Philadelphia native and Xtreame Measures CEO, Dark Lo, connects with Queens legend, Havoc of Mobb Deep for a new collaborative album, "Extreme Measures."
Vado and Styles P are featured on the 11-song project.
All song were produced by Havoc.
Available on all streaming platforms.
Tracklist:
01. Mob Tales Ft. Havoc 02. Lost Innocence 03. Zombie Land Ft. Havoc 04. Extreme Measures Ft. Styles P 05. Greatest Ever 06. Reports 07. Make it Home Ft. Vado 08. Force of Life 09. Dirty Work 10. Captivating 11. Strong Minded
1. Intro 2. Btw 3. White Wine 4. Alpina 5. Panties (feat. Rockwelz) 6. Red Roof Inn 7. Black Blues Brothers (feat. Milano Constantine) 8. Too Late 9. Elephant's Tusk (feat. RIM) 10. Origami (feat. Rockwelz) 11. '96 Bad Boys (feat. Nam Nitty) 12. Muddy Mxnxpxly (feat. Chukk Rukkuz, Rocc Spotz & Maylay Sparks)
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 23, 2021 at 12:44pm
Brian Laundrie would be better off dead than alive at this point in the Gabby Petito case -- at least that's how Geraldo Rivera feels ... despite there being so many unanswered questions.
The FOX News personality gave us his unfiltered take on the streets of NYC Wednesday when we asked what he made of the saga & the fact that Brian is still nowhere to be found. In true Geraldo fashion, he did not hold back whatsoever -- he says the dude should off himself.
He's a little flip here, but GR seems to mean what he says ... adding Brian should have some dignity & spare us his hypothetical BS rationale -- assuming he's ultimately charged -- by just drowning himself in a Florida swamp.
Now, Geraldo does wind it back a little when our photog suggests Brian should give up & turn himself in -- conceding, yes, at the very least. You can tell he's fired up about this story, but there's a major problem with his solution.
It leaves too many loose ends & wouldn't serve as true justice ... especially not for the Petito family, who are seeking the truth about what happened to Gabby & WHY.
Brian committing suicide wouldn't achieve any of that & in this case ... capturing him while he's still breathing would be ideal for everyone.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 23, 2021 at 12:00pm
Video After The Jump
Legendary MC AZ sits down with Ebro in the Morning to go down memory lane, talk about inspiration from Nas and Jay-Z, working with Lil Wayne, T-Pain, Rick Ross & Conway, and his new project 'Do Or Die 2'.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 23, 2021 at 10:30am
Video After The Jump
LordMobb General Flee Lord revisits his highly acclaimed album, "In the Name of Prodigy, to release visuals for "Major Distribution" featuring Busta Rhymes.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 23, 2021 at 10:05am
Video After The Jump
Meredith (CBS46) - A contractor destroyed a bathroom shower he spent hours renovating after the homeowner allegedly refused to pay him -- and the entire ordeal was caught on camera.
A viral video shows a contractor for Dream Home Remodels of Colorado demolishing the shower with a sledgehammer on Sept. 11 in Colorado Springs.
"Is someone going to pay me?" the contractor said in the video. "Let me tell you something. No contractor in the state of Colorado will fix that when they find out that I took it back because she refused to pay me."
The homeowner, Amber Trucke, said she paid $3,330 of the $7,555 bill but wasn't pleased with the work. She said she wanted to inspect it further before handing over the final payment.
"I wanted to be wowed, and I wasn't wowed," Trucke told KRDO-TV. "But I knew he was coming back Friday to clean things up, and I figured maybe I'd be more impressed then. So, I was not going to pay them until I saw the actual finished product."
Jordan Cazares, co-owner of Dream Home Remodels, released a statement to KRDO-TV saying there was a communication breakdown with the homeowner.
"After several weeks of work for a customer, communication broke down at the end of a project," the statement read. "There was no displeasure expressed, and we proceeded to ask for payment on the project by the end of the day. Communication broke further after that and resulted in our company repossessing a tile shower. We regret that this contract went sour."
The company also claims that Trucke did not pay for a vanity, mirror, light fixture, ceiling fans, plumbing work, and an exterior door.
However, Trucke insists she paid for those items and plans to take the company to small claims court, KRDO-TV reported.
Police and the Pikes Peak Regional Building Department are looking into the matter.
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 23, 2021 at 8:59am
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With the business acumen of a Wharton grad and what authorities describe as the recklessness of a common thief, local YouTuber Bill Omar Carrasquillo went, in the span of just three years, from slinging drugs on a North Philadelphia street corner to running a multimillion-dollar streaming TV empire.
He documented every step of that journey in videos posted online, advertising his subscription service and flaunting his newfound wealth in slickly produced footage of high-end sports cars and diamond-encrusted bling set to hip-hop beats.
But all that came crashing down this week as federal authorities accused Carrasquillo — better known to the nearly 800,000 who subscribe to his YouTube channel as “Omi in a Hellcat”— of heading one of the most brazen and successful digital piracy schemes of the last decade.
And, as is only fitting for an internet celebrity who has made a career out of sharing his life online, his arrest early Tuesday at his Swedesboro home was livestreamed on social media.
Photos of Carrasquillo, shirtless and in neon boxer-briefs as agents handcuffed him in his foyer, quickly circulated on Instagram. A video of the arrest shows agents milling around, as a woman streaming it live to the internet repeatedly asks: “What is going on?”
The 62-count indictment charges Carrasquillo, 35, and two business partners — Jesse Gonzales, 42, of Pico Rivera, Calif., and Michael Barone, 36, of Richmond Hill, N.Y. — with counts including conspiracy to commit copyright violations, tax evasion, and fraud that could send them to prison for decades.
It describes their company, run at various points under names like Gears TV and Gears Reloaded, as a media streamer’s paradise. Subscribers had access to hundreds of on-demand movies and television shows, like Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead, as well as access to dozens of live cable channels and pay-per-view events, for a subscription as low as $15 month.
But all of it, authorities say, was stolen from the encrypted set-top box signals of legitimate services like Comcast, Verizon FiOS, and Direct TV and illegally streamed to his thousands of subscribers online.
Prosecutors have moved to strip him of nearly $35 million in assets, including 57 luxury cars — Lamborghinis, Porsches, Bentleys, and McLarens — and a portfolio of more than four dozen properties he has amassed across Philadelphia and the suburbs.
“You can’t just go and monetize someone else’s copyrighted content with impunity,” said Bradley S. Benavides, acting head of the FBI’s Philadelphia office. “Theft is theft, and if you’re going to willfully steal another party’s intellectual property, the FBI stands ready to step in and shut you down.”
The case sits at the cutting edge of digital copyright law and the recent proliferation of services offering cheap streams of protected intellectual property.
So-called illegal IPTV services have grown into a $1 billion-a-year industry in the U.S., according to recent studies, with as many as 7% of North American households subscribing through hardware widely available online and preloaded with apps to access copyrighted content.
Carrasquillo’s service shut down in 2019 and Congress took steps last year to more clearly define such businesses as illegal.
But Carrasquillo’s lawyer, Donte Mills, maintained Wednesday that at the time Gears TV was up and running, there was no law explicitly prohibiting how it operated.
He likened his client to tech innovators Mark Zuckerberg and Steve Jobs — whose 2015 biopic, as it happens, was available to stream on Carrasquillo’s network.
“There were no regulations when he did it,” Mills said. “We will prove the charges he received do not apply to his conduct.”
Still, Carrasquillo made no attempt to hide the money he was making. His service netted him and his partners more than $34 million between 2016 and 2019 alone, according to the indictment.
His Instagram offers a steady stream of luxury — photos of custom jewelry and the latest additions to his car collection interspersed with photos of his family, including one of his son holding stacks of cash.
He posts multiple YouTube videos a week with titles like “Giving $1,000 to a pizza delivery guy,” “Omi in a Hellcat makes over $1,100,000 in one week” and “Omi in a Hellcat buys a $500,000 Lamborghini”
In court filings, prosecutors said, he filed no personal or corporate tax returns for any of that wealth and that before his streaming service the only legitimate income he made was roughly $550 a year in advertising royalties from his YouTube page.
His arrest this week did not entirely come as a surprise.
For months, Carrasquillo has openly discussed his status as the target of an FBI investigation on his YouTube channel, admitting in videos — alternatively morose and defiant — to tax violations he says he committed in ignorance and predicting that he’ll end up in prison.
“You gotta be humble in victory and humble in defeat,” he said in one posted after a 2019 FBI raid of his home. “I’m gonna do a couple of years off of this. I’m going to go to jail for a couple of years.”
In others, like an interview with YouTuber “Say Cheese!” posted last year, Carrasquillo reflected on his rise from a 9-year-old boy who learned the drug trade at the hand of his father in North Philadelphia into a man who, at 28, swore off dope dealing to launch the venture that made him millions.
He has accused the feds of taking an interest only because he is a Black man from North Philadelphia who grew up poor and then struck it rich.
And consistently, Carrasquillo has maintained he is not guilty of copyright crimes.
“I hit a … gray area and exploited it, and they just didn’t like it,” he said in a 2019 video posted under the title “THE FBI SEIZED EVERYTHING FROM ME.” “I made a ton of money … I’m only guilty of making money. I ain’t guilty of nothing else.”
Carrasquillo says he legally paid for subscriptions to all the cable services whose content he is accused of sharing. He likens what he did to inviting friends who don’t have cable over and taking up a collection to pay for a pay-per-view event.
But in a similar case the Justice Department filed in 2019 against eight men behind the IPTV piracy site Jetflix, defense lawyers sought to have the charges tossed, arguing that simply sharing legally obtained DVDs and television shows with others was not illegal.
Prosecutors pushed back, noting that the men weren’t charged with sharing the copyrighted content but rather reproducing it online without permission for their 30,000 subscribers.
The judge declined to dismiss the case. The next test of their argument will come when the case goes before a jury next year.
As he awaits his turn in court, Carrasquillo appears to like his odds. Within hours of his arrest, he was released from custody pending trial.
And he’s expressed confidence that even if he loses the cars, his home and his once-flush bank accounts, he can climb back to the top.
“I became a millionaire once,” he said in a recent video. “I can do it 150 more times.”
Posted by ChasinDatPaper on September 23, 2021 at 8:00am
Video After The Jump
S Eyes Finest works with Rome Streetz & Daniel Son to bring you the official animated video for "All Blakk'' - Now available on Bandcamp. This is the sixth single off of S Eyes Finest compilation album ''WeatheredThaStorm''.
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