The
Killing of Tupac Shakur by Cathy Scott
Description: Who did it and why? Tupac Amaru Shakur was the most popular
rapper in the world. No one symbolized the violence at the heart of gangsta
rap more than Tupac, and he ultimately fell victim to that violence, gunned
down in a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas at age 25. This raw, no-holds-barred
account discloses new information, including exclusive photo evidence,
about the unsolved murder of Tupac: the failed investigation, the rap wars,
the killing of Biggie Smalls, the Bloods-Crips connection, and the many
possible motives leading to the murder that rocked the music world.
Paperback from Huntington Press
LAbyrinth:
A Detective Investigates the Murders of Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls,
the Implication of Death Row Records' Suge Knight, and the Origins of the
Los Angeles Police Scandal by Randall Sullivan
Book Description: Flaunt magazine declares LAbyrinth "absolutely
impossible to put down" -- a book whose stunning discoveries are nonetheless
"incredibly thorough and surprisingly credible." Acclaimed journalist Randall
Sullivan follows Russell Poole, a highly decorated LAPD detective who in
1997 was called to investigate a controversial cop-on-cop shooting, and
eventually discovered that the officer killed was tied to Marion "Suge"
Knight's notorious gangsta-rap label, Death Row Records. During his investigation,
Poole would come to realize that a growing cadre of black officers were
allied not only with Death Row but with the murderous Bloods street gang.
And incredibly, he began to uncover evidence that at least some of these
"gangsta cops" may have been involved in the murders of rap superstars
Notorious B.I.G. and Tupac Shakur. Still more shocking is what happened
when Russell Poole became lead investigator in the murder of Notorious
B.I.G.: as his shrewd detective work pointed to crooked cops such as David
Mack, who orchestrated one of the biggest bank heists in Los Angeles history,
Poole found his investigation stifled by a police chief wary of doing further
damage to a department already sullied by the O. J. Simpson trial, the
Rodney King beating, and the Rampart corruption scandal. Could it be that
the Rampart scandal -- in which dozens of officers were implicated in a
conspiracy of robbery, brutality, drug dealing, and false imprisonment
-- was only a smokescreen for a far more damaging debacle? Igniting a firestorm
of controversy in the music industry and the Los Angeles media, the hardcover
publication of LAbyrinth helped to prompt two lawsuits against the LAPD
(one brought by the widow and mother of Notorious B.I.G., the other by
Poole himself) that may finally bring this story completely out of the
shadows. Entertainment Weekly insists that "no single source presents so
complete or damning a record" of this "compelling" epic tale of L.A. noir.
Hardcover: 384 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 1.17 x
9.29 x 6.27
Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Pr; (April 2, )
ISBN: 0871138387
