Chuck Philips
Charles Alan Philips was an American writer and journalist. He was best known for his investigative reporting in the Los Angeles Times on the culture, corruption, and crime in the music industry during the 1990s and 2000s, which garnered both awards and controversy. In 1999, Philips won a Pulitzer Prize, with Michael A. Hiltzik, for their co-authored series exposing corruption in the entertainment industry.
Philips reported extensively in the Los Angeles Times on the East Coast–West Coast hip hop rivalry and the murders of Tupac Shakur and Christopher Wallace aka the Notorious B.I.G. and their respective investigations. In 2002, Philips described Las Vegas' floundered probe into Tupac's murder and put forth his own theory based on a yearlong investigation. His controversial theory, which alleges the involvement of the late Wallace, has been neither confirmed nor verifiably debunked and continues to be debated.
In a 2008 article, Philips tied industry executives Sean "Puffy" Combs and James Rosemond to the 1994 ambush of Shakur. In response, both Combs and Rosemond issued scathing statements of denial and received out-of-court settlements from the paper. Documents sourced by Philips to support his claims were later proven to be fabricated. Philips stood by his story despite the falsified documents. The Times ran a retraction along with apologies from Philips and his editors, and parted ways with Philips a few months later.
Philips' reporting is widely cited in media, including trade publications, journals, books, and podcasts. Critics allege an obsession with unsolved crimes in the hip-hop community, interference with official investigations, and biased coverage of the Los Angeles Police Department and Death Row Records. Philips died in January 2024, at the age of 71.
Early life and education
Philips grew up in the Detroit area and attended Franklin High School. He moved to Los Angeles at age 19 and worked for the Wasserman Silk Screen Company of Santa Monica, California, while studying at California State University, Long Beach, where he received a B.A. in journalism in 1989.Career
Philips spent a majority of his career writing for the Los Angeles Times, beginning as a freelance writer in 1990 and joining the staff in 1995. He remained at the Times until being laid off in 2008. He wrote several investigative pieces and series about the music industry, particularly on controversial business practices, corruption, and crime. Philips has also written for The Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, Rolling Stone, Spin, The Village Voice, AllHipHop and The Source.Investigating the business of entertainment
In 1991, Philips wrote an article exposing rampant sexual harassment in the music industry. He revealed, "Industry sources say sexual comportment has been a behind-the-scenes factor in certain recent executive shake-ups." The article details four cases of harassment at a prominent entertainment law firm and three record labels, Geffen Records, RCA Records, and Island Records. Philips continued relentless coverage and other media outlets followed suit. A follow-up interview in which a victim graphicly describes her experience led to more women sharing their stories. By 1995, all six major record labels had updated their sexual harassment policies.Gangsta rap battle of 1992
In the summer of 1992, Philips provided a platform to rapper Ice-T, who had just released one of the most controversial songs of all time, "Cop Killer." Ice-T was under fire from police and politicians, including President George H. W. Bush, who called the song "sick." In his first interview after the controversy broke, the artist defended his role in a culture war. On the front page of the Los Angeles Times, in a Q&A about rock, race, and the "Cop Killer" furor, Ice-T counterattacked his critics, saying: "Arnold Schwarzenegger blew away dozens of cops as the Terminator. But I don’t hear anybody complaining."Despite the song being a product of Ice-T's heavy metal band Body Count, it was ensnared in a campaign to ban gangsta rap. He complained:
Ice-T had been accused of inciting violence against police officers. He illuminated Philips and his readers on the message of the song: "No way all I’m doing on this record is playing a character I invented who’s fed up with police abuse. He’s not the average person who just figured out after the Rodney King incident that police brutality exists. This particular character has seen it too long and he loses it and goes on a rampage. What I’m trying to tell people is that police brutality in the ‘hood is nothing new. And the thing is that whether this guy, the cop killer in my song, is real or not, believe it, there are people at that point. OK? But anybody who says that my record is going to make them go over that point, that’s bulls---. No record can take a man to that point.
Anti-censorship advocate, Rock the Vote co-founder and then Virgin Records executive Jeff Ayeroff called attention to the hypocrisy, "It’s not like the White House expresses any interest in trying to resolve the polarization that this song reflects. They just want to exploit the fear of this potent black artist to their own political advantage."
Philips himself surmised:
Murder of Tupac Shakur theory
On September 7, 1996, Shakur was shot in a drive-by shooting in Las Vegas. He died six days later due to the wounds inflicted. In 2002, following a yearlong investigation into the murder by the Los Angeles Times, Philips concluded that Shakur was killed by purported suspect Orlando Anderson, a member of the Southside Compton Crips gang. Philips made an additional claim: "The murder weapon was supplied by New York rapper Notorious B.I.G., who agreed to pay the Crips $1 million for killing Shakur." In the days following the story, friends and family members denied any involvement by the late Wallace. The Wallace family issued a statement expressing outrage and called the article "irresponsible journalism." Friends provided alibis claiming Wallace was not in Las Vegas on the night of the shooting.In an online chat in 2008, Philips told the participants that unidentified sources placed Wallace in Nevada on the night of Shakur's murder. He added:
Louis Alfred, the recording engineer named in the session reports provided by Bad Boy, recalled a late-night recording session, but thought it unlikely it was the same night Shakur was shot. "We would have heard about it," he said.
No one has been arrested or prosecuted for the murder of Shakur and the case remains open. More than two decades following its publication, Philips' is among the theories still presented by the media.
Pivotal article on 1994 ambush of Shakur
While investigating Shakur's murder, Philips learned more about the 1994 ambush of Shakur in New York City. On March 17, 2008, he reported in the Los Angeles Times that the attack had been orchestrated by then talent manager and dealmaker James Rosemond a.k.a. Jimmy Henchman. Twelve years before Philips implicated Rosemond, lyrics to Shakur's song "Against All Odds" hinted at a connection: "Promised a payback, Jimmy Henchmen, in due time, I knew you bitch niggas was listening, the world is mine, set me up, wet me up, niggas stuck me up."Philips' story also claimed that Combs and Wallace had advance knowledge of the attack. To support his theory, Philips relied on unidentified sources and FBI transcripts of an interview with a confidential informant. Both Rosemond and Combs responded swiftly with statements denying Philips' claims.
On March 25, 2008, The Smoking Gun exposed the FBI documents sourced by Philips as fabrications. The extended bombshell piece began:
On March 26, 2008, the Los Angeles Times announced an internal investigation and published an apology from Philips that read, "In relying on documents that I now believe were fake, I failed to do my job. I’m sorry." Philips was chastised by his peers and the paper was criticized for its "useless policies for controlling its overuse of unnamed sources." Philips' editors also issued statements:
On April 7, 2008, the Los Angeles Times issued a lengthy front-page retraction. The paper's investigation concluded that "the FBI reports were fabricated and that some of the other sources relied on — including the person Philips previously believed to be the ‘confidential source’ cited in the FBI reports — do not support major elements of the story."
This would be the last article Philips would write for the Los Angeles Times. On July 15, 2008, it was reported that he was let go in a round of layoffs. Philips later called foul on the career-ending retraction:
Philips later claimed, " twisted smokingun.com’s indictment of the fake 302s into an exoneration of his role in the Quad ambush. Then he and his attorney, Jeffrey Lichtman, distorted smokinggun’s conclusions into a vile smear campaign against me online, attacking my credibility, demanding I be fired. They got their wish. Jimmy and Jeffrey fleeced the newspaper for a quarter million bucks, snookered them into printing a false retraction, plus walked away with my head on a platter."
Subsequent witness statements
In the intervening years, there have been several developments with the individuals, named and unnamed in Philips' article, and others involved in the incident.- Dexter Isaac – In June 2011, the prison inmate confessed to being a perpetrator in Shakur's attack and claimed to have been paid $2,500 by Rosemond to rob Shakur.
- * Philips confirmed Isaac as a source for his 2008 article and demanded an apology and a retraction of the retraction from the Los Angeles Times.
- * The Los Angeles Times reiterated their reason for the retraction and declined Philips' request stating, "No new information has emerged that bears on the mistakes for which we apologized and which we retracted."
- * Rosemond claims Isaac is a confidential informant who cannot be trusted.
- * Rosemond's lawyer dismissed the claim: "It's a flat-out lie. Dexter Isaac is not claiming this 17 years later to clear his conscience. He's doing it because he's told anybody who will listen he doesn't want to die in prison. He has kids and wants to work off his sentence. He can't be trusted."
- James Rosemond – Incarcerated as of 2010, he is serving multiple life sentences for operating a Continuing Criminal Enterprise and the murder-for-hire of G-Unit artist Lowell "Lodi Mack" Fletcher.
- * During opening remarks at Rosemond's 2011 trial, the prosecutor said Rosemond had implicated himself in the shooting of Shakur at Quad.
- * Rosemond's attorney Gerald Shargel "categorically and emphatically" denied the claim. Referencing the 2008 Los Angeles Times article, Shargel implied Philips had engaged in a smear campaign. He added, " statement was positively and absolutely false whether intentional, or not intentional. I think not intentional. She was not the prosecutor who sat in on any of the proffer sessions with Mr. Rosemond."
- * The prosecutor continued, "If Mr. Shargel is going to argue that this was a fabricated article, it's the government's position that we can put in the defendant's own admission about that particular shooting. In saying it is not true, when in fact it is true, the government should be able to rebut that argument that he's making, that the defendant actually admitted to this 1994 shooting."
- James Sabatino – The document forger is still pulling cons from prison.
- Zayd Malik – A friend of Shakur who accompanied him that night categorically rejects Isaac's confession in a rare interview in 2018. He also denies a setup by Rosemond, but alludes to NYPD involvement.