by Ran Britt
Kenneth McGriff was born September 19, 1959, in South Jamaica, Queens, New York. Both of his parents were employees of the city transit department. South Jamaica boasts several well-known former residents including: NBA players Lamar Odom and Rafer "Skip to My Lou" Alston; former NBA player and Olympic gold medalist Bob Beamon; rapper Onika "Nicki Minaj" Maraj; rapper Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson; the members of the rap group Onyx; Christopher "Lloyd Banks" Lloyd and Marvin "Tony Yayo" Bernard of the rap group G-Unit; rapper Troy "Pharoahe Monch" Jamerson; the members of the rap group Lost Boyz; rapper Germaine "Canibus" Williams; rapper Juaquin "Waka Flocka Flame" Malphurs; and rapper Ollie "Ali Vegas" Williams.
McGriff attended P.S. 140 Edward K. Ellington for elementary school and later Francis Lewis High School in Fresh Meadows, Queens. He was given the Five Percent name, Supreme, in 1971 when he was a student at Catherine and Count Basie Junior High School 72, located in the nearby Rochdale Village neighborhood. The Five Percenters are members of a sect of Islam founded in 1964 by Clarence 13X, a former student of Malcolm X.
McGriff attended P.S. 140 Edward K. Ellington for elementary school and later Francis Lewis High School in Fresh Meadows, Queens. He was given the Five Percent name, Supreme, in 1971 when he was a student at Catherine and Count Basie Junior High School 72, located in the nearby Rochdale Village neighborhood. The Five Percenters are members of a sect of Islam founded in 1964 by Clarence 13X, a former student of Malcolm X.
Before being dubbed the Supreme Team, McGriff's circle, into which he recruited his nephew, Gerald "Prince" Miller, as his second-in-command, was initially referred to by outsiders as the Peace G*ds -- a reference to the phrase commonly used by group members as a greeting. Though McGriff is Miller's uncle, the former is merely two years the latter's senior and the two essentially grew up together. The group also included members such as David "Bing" Robinson, Troy "Babywise" Jones, Ernesto "Puerto Rican Righteous" Piniella, Melson, G*d B, Serious, Philip "Dahlu" Banks, Deemo and Nathan "Green Eyed Born" May. Initially, the group's criminal activities consisted mainly of burglaries and bank robberies. In order to decrease tensions in the area and to more readily repel rival groups, the Peace G*ds allied themselves with the Seven Crowns, a 1970s South Jamaica street gang whose membership included future drug kingpins Lorenzo "Fat Cat" Nichols and Anthony "Pretty Tony" Feurtado.
McGriff started his drug career as a stash house guard for heroin kingpin and Hollis, Queens native Ronald "Ronnie Bumps" Bassett. The group got involved in drug dealing in 1983, selling small quantities of heroin and cocaine on the corner of Sutphin Boulevard and 150th Street. The group maintained a high-profile, partying at popular New York City nightclubs including the Latin Quarter and the Red Parrot in Manhattan, Brooklyn's Empire Rollerdome, and Disco Fever in the South Bronx.
Southeast Queens was effectively split into different territories by the various drug traffickers that shared the area, including: Lorenzo "Fat Cat" Nichols; Tommy "Tony Montana" Mickens; the Corley Brothers; Claude Skinner; and the Feurtado Brothers. The re-named Supreme Team used the Baisley Park Houses housing project, with its 1,057 residents, as a base of operations.
A distinguishing feature of the group was the fact that it was racially integrated. While the majority of members were African-American, its ranks were comprised of Latinos as well.
On July 1, 1984, Gerald Miller was released from prison after serving a sentence for a burglary conviction and immediately resumed his position as McGriff's second-in-command. Miller was introduced to the group's narcotics business and would quickly become McGriff's chief enforcer.
In 1984, the Supreme Team incorporated crack, the freebase form of the drug cocaine, into its repertoire. The organization's brands of crack, marketed as "Thriller" and "Ghostbuster", proved tremendously successful and by the end of 1985, the Supreme Team had expanded outward from South Jamaica to dominate the drug trade in other southeastern Queens neighborhoods, including Springfield Gardens and St. Albans.
McGriff divided the organization into four separate "crews", each led by a lieutenant: James "Bimmy" Antney, who performed armed robberies before joining the Supreme Team; Troy "Babywise" Jones; Gerald "Prince" Miller; and Colbert "Black Justice" Johnson, who worked his way up from his beginnings as a worker for Jones.
One way in which the four divisions distinguished themselves was by using different colored tops for the vials in which they packaged crack and heroin. McGriff directed each crew to use a unique color for vial tops. Jones' crew used red tops, Johnson's used orange, Antney's used blue and Miller used yellow. The organization's members routinely wore red jackets with the word "Supreme" displayed on the back. They also favored dressing in military fatigues. Workers who made direct sales to crack users routinely shouted the phrase, "No singles, no shorts" -- meaning: don't pay with single dollar bills and don't ask for discounts.
On July 1, 1984, Gerald Miller was released from prison after serving a sentence for a burglary conviction and immediately resumed his position as McGriff's second-in-command. Miller was introduced to the group's narcotics business and would quickly become McGriff's chief enforcer.
In 1984, the Supreme Team incorporated crack, the freebase form of the drug cocaine, into its repertoire. The organization's brands of crack, marketed as "Thriller" and "Ghostbuster", proved tremendously successful and by the end of 1985, the Supreme Team had expanded outward from South Jamaica to dominate the drug trade in other southeastern Queens neighborhoods, including Springfield Gardens and St. Albans.
McGriff divided the organization into four separate "crews", each led by a lieutenant: James "Bimmy" Antney, who performed armed robberies before joining the Supreme Team; Troy "Babywise" Jones; Gerald "Prince" Miller; and Colbert "Black Justice" Johnson, who worked his way up from his beginnings as a worker for Jones.
Supreme Team lieutenant James "Bimmy" Antney
One way in which the four divisions distinguished themselves was by using different colored tops for the vials in which they packaged crack and heroin. McGriff directed each crew to use a unique color for vial tops. Jones' crew used red tops, Johnson's used orange, Antney's used blue and Miller used yellow. The organization's members routinely wore red jackets with the word "Supreme" displayed on the back. They also favored dressing in military fatigues. Workers who made direct sales to crack users routinely shouted the phrase, "No singles, no shorts" -- meaning: don't pay with single dollar bills and don't ask for discounts.
The organization guarded against law enforcement by using coded language and employing sentries equipped with walkie-talkies stationed on the rooftops of the five, eight-story buildings that comprised the Baisley Park Houses. Supreme Team members also drove armor-plated vehicles, routinely monitored police scanners and used high-powered weapons, including: AR-15s; MAC-10s; TEC-9 sub-machine guns; and high-caliber handguns such as .45s, .357s and nine-millimeters. Manuals such as Point Blank Body Armor, The Silencer Handbook, Improved Sabotage Devices and Methods of Disguise were distributed to members by Supreme Team upper management.
In early July, 1985, a Supreme Team stash house located at 166-66 231st Street was robbed of $80,000 worth of cocaine and cash and subsequently, a shooting death occurred at another stash house located on Guy R. Brewer Boulevard, a major thoroughfare in Queens. On September 10, NYPD Narcotics officers led by Sergeant Clyde Foster executed a search warrant, which cited unregistered confidential informant sources, for the 231st Street location and another address linked to McGriff. Police made seven drug arrests at the first stash house and seized narcotics and rifles. McGriff and David "Bing" Robinson were among the five arrested during the raid on another location, apartment 166-16 located on 231st Street in Cambria Heights. Police seized $35,000 in cash; eight pounds of cocaine and heroin; eight handguns; and drug paraphernalia including vials and scales.
Lorenzo "Fat Cat" Nichols and Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff
McGriff pled guilty to criminal possession of a controlled substance in the second degree on May 19, 1986. Robinson was sentenced to six years to life in state prison and McGriff to nine years to life in state prison. Gerald Miller assumed leadership of the organization's day-to-day operation for the duration of McGriff's sentence. However, both Robinson's and McGriff's convictions were overturned on appeal due to search warrant improprieties and the two were released after serving 22 months at the Elmira Correctional Facility located in southwestern New York. Police estimate that Miller and McGriff ordered eight murders during the latter's incarceration.
McGriff was popular among South Jamaica residents due in part to his hosting community parties and concerts featuring big-name rap groups. McGriff hired Def Jam Records artists LL Cool J, the Beastie Boys and also Run DMC through company co-founder Russell Simmons during the music label's early years. He also held turkey giveaways for local residents during the holiday season. McGriff also sponsored an annual summer basketball tournament at Baisley Pond Park, featuring $50,000 in prize money, titled Supreme's Nite International Fastbreak Festival (SNIFF). Fellow southeast Queens drug lord James "Wall" Corley entered a team into the tournament and Harlem drug kingpin Rich Porter entered a team that won the tournament, collecting the prize money and an additional $40,000 as a result of betting on himself to win. The Paid in Full Posse, consisting of members: William "Rakim" Griffin and Eric "Eric B." Barrier of the rap group Eric B. and Rakim; Griffin's cousin, Jason Riley; Barrier's brother, Ant Live; Kelvin "50 Cent" Martin; Benjamin "Killer Ben" O'Garro; Supreme Magnetic and his brother, Rap; AJ; Keith "Money" Green; and Rob Garcia, participated as well. On July 30, 1987, referee Gregory Vaughn was beaten to death following a disputed call during one of the games.
A joint state and federal investigation of the Supreme Team culminated in a raid on the Baisley Park Houses on November 6, 1987, during which McGriff was arrested again. During the raid, FBI agents and police seized a kilogram of cocaine, weapons, drug paraphernalia, surveillance equipment and government documents.
Following his arrest, McGriff ordered that Supreme Team member James Page be killed upon learning that Page was cooperating with prosecutors. McGriff learned of Page's cooperation when Ernesto Piniella was given government documents by his parole officer, Ina McGriff (no relation to Kenneth), with whom he had become sexually involved.
The Supreme Team is estimated to have had at least 110 members and employees and generated revenue in excess of $200,000 per day from street sales of crack-cocaine during the height of its prominence in 1987. Screenwriter Barry Michael Cooper drew inspiration from Kenneth McGriff for the 1991 film, New Jack City. Cooper based Nino Brown; his drug ring, the CMB (Cash Money Brothers); and their dominance of the Carter Apartments partly on McGriff, the Supreme Team and the Baisley Park Houses, respectively.
Baisley Park Houses
Miller, who had been incarcerated prior to the Baisley Park Houses sweep, was again given control of the organization's day-to-day operation when he was released in the spring of 1989. Under Miller's management, enforcer Wilfedo "C-Justice" Arroyo acted as second-in-command; David "Bing" Robinson kept records and assisted in supervising the overall narcotics operations; Roy Hale, Julio Hernandez and Shannon Jimenez reported to Ernesto "Puerto Rican Righteous" Piniella, who was appointed head of security; Raymond Robinson helped to procure cocaine from suppliers, supervised the processing of cocaine into crack, and delivered crack to distributors; Ronald "Tuck" Tucker and Waverly "Teddy" Coleman, who joined in 1986 at the age of 17 and began as a hand-to-hand dealer, became lieutenants who managed retail locations and supervised workers; and Harry "Big C" Hunt was Miller's bodyguard. The restructured organization established its headquarters in the Baisley Park Homes apartment of Robinson's mother and began to make up for the loss of business that resulted after the raids in 1987, generating revenue in excess of $10,000 per day from the sale of crack-cocaine. Miller engendered loyalty and goodwill among Baisley Park residents by distributing $3,000 in dollar bills to community children each week.
According to court records, "Tucker, Coleman, and David Robinson would deliver to the apartment the moneys received at the retail spots they supervised; Miller and the Team's primary drug courier Tent "Serious" Morris would negotiate cocaine deals by telephone with William Graham, a supplier who had Colombian connections; and Morris and Raymond Robinson would then drive to Graham's apartment with money to purchase kilogram-quantities of cocaine. The cocaine would be brought back to the Robinson apartment, where it was processed as crack, packaged, and given to Arroyo, David Robinson, Tucker, or Coleman, who in turn arranged for its sale by street-level employees."
In July of 1989, Miller, Arroyo, Hale, Hunt and Jimenez robbed four Colombian suppliers of two kilos of cocaine and subsequently murdered them. That August, Gus Rivera, the Supreme Team member who'd introduced the suppliers to Miller, was non-fatally shot in the head by Hunt in a Baisley Park courtyard. Hale and Arroyo subsequently shot Rivera to death in a Queens motel room.
That same month, organization members murdered two more suppliers after robbing them of their cocaine. When Colombian drug traffickers Pablo Perlaza and Fernando Suarez showed up to Hale's Baisley Park apartment for a pre-arranged transaction, Julio Hernandez held them at gunpoint while Hale and Arroyo bound the two with duct tape and tied plastic bags over their heads. Hale then proceeded to beat them with a baseball bat.
Also in 1989, McGriff pleaded guilty to engaging in a Continuing Criminal Enterprise (CCE). He was represented by famed defense attorney Robert Simels, who engineered a plea agreement that resulted in a 12-year sentence for McGriff instead of the potential 150 years he faced. Simels' client list also included southeast Queens drug kingpins Tommy "Tony Montana" Mickens and Lorenzo "Fat Cat" Nichols; teenaged heroin kingpin "Boy George" Rivera; mob informant Henry Hill, the inspiration for the lead character in the film Goodfellas; and former New York Jets star football players Ken O'Brien and Mark Gastineau. Simels himself was convicted of witness tampering in 2009 and sentenced to a 14-year prison sentence.
Julio Hernandez was arrested by federal agents in February of 1990. In March, several other members of the organization were arrested by the NYPD and charged with narcotics trafficking by the Queens County District Attorney's Office. Supreme Team member Trent Morris agreed to be a cooperating witness for the state of New York at Miller's trial and his wife and child were relocated out of concern for their safety.
In November of 1991, both Gerald Miller and organization member William Graham won motions to suppress tapes of conversations gathered from wiretaps on their home telephones. The state court cited false statements on the warrant applications for the wiretaps and the cases were dismissed. In December, Graham was indicted for three counts of narcotics trafficking and was eventually convicted in federal court, which allowed the wiretap evidence, and given a 30-year sentence. In January, Miller and 11 others were indicted by a federal grand jury. Miller's 10 counts included charges for narcotics trafficking, racketeering and witness intimidation.
Miller's trial began on April 26, 1993, and featured 80 prosecution witnesses, including: Ernesto Piniella; Julio Hernandez; Trent Morris; Gus Rivera's girlfriend, Toni McGee; and Ina McGriff. The government also introduced tapes and transcripts of over 100 wiretapped conversations between organization members into evidence. Among other things, prosecutors detailed how Ina McGriff furnished organization members with fake IDs, ammunition and confidential parole information.
The government also illustrated how Miller aided drug kingpin Lorenzo Nichols in two shootings, one of which resulted in the death of the victim. According to testimony from Ina McGriff and Ernesto Piniella, Miller paid McGriff and her secretary, Ronnie Younger, $3,000 in exchange for providing the addresses of brothers Isaac and Henry Bolden, whom Nichols, who was incarcerated at the time, suspected of robbing his organization. After the information was given to members of Nichols' organization, Isaac Bolden was shot to death near his mother's home. Henry Bolden was shot at his home in the Bronx.
On June 21, Miller was found guilty of seven counts, including drug trafficking, narcotics conspiracy, running a continuing criminal enterprise, racketeering and murder. Several other Supreme Team members were found guilty at the trial as well. Ronald "Tuck" Tucker was sentenced to 14 years in prison. David "Bing" Robinson was convicted of drug trafficking and racketeering and sentenced to 15 years. Shannon Jimenez was convicted of narcotics conspiracy and sentenced to 30 years in prison and Harry "Big C" Hunt was given two concurrent life sentences. Roy Hale, who'd agreed to cooperate with authorities prior to the trial and subsequently changed his mind, was also given two concurrent life sentences. In addition to drug trafficking and racketeering convictions, Wilfredo "C-Justice" Arroyo was also found guilty of three counts of murder and sentenced to six concurrent life terms. All seven were convicted of conspiracy to distribute, and to possession with intent to distribute, cocaine base and all except Jimenez were convicted of violating the RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization) Act, though Miller's narcotics conspiracy conviction was reversed on appeal. Waverly "Teddy" Coleman and Raymond Robinson were tried separately from Miller and the others. Coleman was sentenced to 13 years in prison and Robinson was sentenced to 19 years in prison after being convicted of drug trafficking and racketeering.
Kenneth McGriff was granted early parole in 1994. McGriff was released to his father's home in South Jamaica where he organized a business selling pictures of nude women to inmates. Following a parole violation after his release, he was ordered back to prison that same year and served another 2 years and 6 months. Also, that same year, Supreme Team lieutenant James "Bimmy" Antney was freed when his $2 million bail was paid by R&B stars Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown. Due in no small part to his relationship with childhood friend and Hollis, Queens neighbor, rapper James "LL Cool J" Todd Smith, Antney would go on to have a successful career in the music industry, most notably as an A&R at Def Jam Records. He served as executive producer on rapper Richard "Slick Rick" Walter's gold album The Art of Storytelling and LL Cool J's chart-topping G.O.A.T. and G.O.A.T. 2. Antney's nephew is rapper Juaquin "Waka Flocka Flame" Malphurs and his sister is successful music manager Debra Antney, whose clients include her son, Malphurs, Radric "Gucci Mane" Davis, Karim "French Montana" Kharbouch and Onika "Nicki Minaj" Maraj.
On May 12, 1995, Gerald "Prince" Miller was sentenced to seven concurrent life terms in federal prison, plus a 20-year term to be served concurrently with his life terms.
On April 8, 1998, a four-month undercover investigation culminated in a late-night raid of the Baisly Park Houses conducted by the NYPD and Queens District Attorney's office. The raid resulted in the arrests of 24 members of the Supreme Team, including long-time member Damon Kearsley. Besides Kearsley, the 24 men and women arrested on drug charges included his older sister Dionne, Audrey Lee, Damon Belk, Andrew Hobson, Javier and Gabriel Reyes and Mark Haynes. Troy Smith and William Gillard were arrested on weapons charges. The organization is estimated to have generated revenue in excess of $500,000 per year from the sale of crack, cocaine and marijuana prior to the arrests.
On December 11, 1999, long-time Supreme Team lieutenant Colbert "Black Just" Johnson was shot to death by rival drug trafficker and aspiring rapper Eric "E-Moneybags" Smith. Surveillance footage showed Johnson's body being dropped off at a local hospital by another man driving an SUV, widely believed to be McGriff, hours after Smith shot Johnson in the leg. Smith was shot to death himself seven months later on July 16, while talking on a cell phone and sitting in his Lincoln Navigator on 111th Road in Queens Village, Queens. Smith was hit with 10 of the 40 shots fired into his vehicle. He was found with a loaded gun next to his foot.
On August 24, 2001, authorities raided a stash house in Owings Mills, Maryland linked to McGriff and seized crack, cocaine, heroin, a stolen Ruger 9mm handgun, $30,000 cash and videotapes. Police also found a certificate, under one of McGriff's aliases, for the completion of a handgun training course in nearby Glen Burnie, Maryland. The raid followed the double murder of McGriff associate Karon Russell "Buddha" Clarett and Dwayne Thomas that occurred in the parking lot outside of the stash house, located at the Red Run Apartments complex, two days earlier. Investigators alleged that another of McGriff's business associates, Victor Wright, murdered Clarrett because McGriff suspected him of deciding to cooperate with investigators following his arrest four months prior in North Carolina, during which he was found with two kilograms of cocaine . It's believed that Thomas was murdered in order to eliminate him as a potential witness. Wright and McGriff associate Vash-ti Paylor were charged with drug trafficking following the raid. Wright was also charged with murder. McGriff was subsequently arrested at the Loews Hotel located in the ritzy Miami Beach, Florida neighborhood South Beach, and charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, on December 28, 2002. On June 2, 2003, he was sentenced to 37 months in federal prison after pleading guilty. Around the same time, he was facing pending New York state gun charges stemming from a July 2001 traffic stop in Harlem, during which he was found with $10,000 cash, a driver's license registered to an alias and a loaded .40-caliber handgun in his waistband after police pulled over his BMW.
On January 3, 2003, the FBI and NYPD executed a raid on the offices of the successful rap label, Murder Inc. Records, which generated $200 million from 1999 - 2003. Though no one was arrested, agents seized hard drives, laptops and business documents in an attempt to find evidence of the company laundering money in collusion with McGriff. McGriff reportedly forged a friendship with Murder Inc. Records founder and fellow Queens-native Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo and his brother Christopher "Chris Gotti" Lorenzo, in 1994, following an introduction at a music video shoot in South Jamaica, after his release from prison. At the time, Lorenzo was employed as an A&R rep for TVT Records. The raid was in connection to a probe launched by the U.S. attorney's office in Brookly, NY. McGriff made a cameo appearance alongside Lorenzo in the music video for rapper Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins' song "Murda 4 Life".
March 25, 2003, marked the DVD release of the McGriff-produced film Crime Partners, featuring rappers Tracy "Ice-T" Marrow, Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins, Calvin "Snoop Doggy Dogg" Broadus, Taheem "Cadillac Tah" Crocker and Tiffany "Charli Baltimore" Lane. In 1998, McGriff collaborated with Chaz "Slim" Williams in an effort to secure the rights to produce a film adaptation of the 1972 Donald Goines novel, "Black Gangster." Though that film was never produced, McGriff secured the rights to Goines' 1974 novel "Crime Partners" in 2002 and the movie was produced through his company, Picture Perfect Films.
That same year, McGriff's nephew, Lawrence "Wise" McGriff, was released after serving a 16-year sentence in prison. He is now vice president of marketing and promotion and vice president of A&R for Universal Def Jam Records.
A 2003 affidavit by IRS investigators revealed that federal agents suspected McGriff of ordering the murder of rapper Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, which resulted in his near-fatal shooting in Jamaica, Queens on May 25, 2000. The affivadit attributes McGriff's alleged motive to his having been angered by Jackson's song, "Ghetto Qu'ran", in which he discusses McGriff's criminal past. Jackson's crack-addicted mother, Sabrina, is believed to have sold cocaine for the Supreme Team at the time of her murder at the age of 23 in 1984. Jackson has stated publicly that his mother was asphyxiated when someone drugged her drink, causing her to lose consciousness, and subsequently closed all the windows before turning on the gas in her apartment.
In March of 2004, the government ordered the seizure of all assets of McGriff's companies, Picture Perfect Films and Picture Perfect Entertainment, including all proceeds of Crime Partners, including DVD and soundtrack sales.
McGriff lieutenant Dennis "Divine" Crosby and his girlfriend Nicole Brown were charged with murder in aid of racketeering on November 18, 2004, when investigators alleged that one of the videotapes confiscated during the Maryland stash house raid contained surveillance footage of Eric "E-Moneybags" Smith taken by the two from Brown's apartment, located on the same street on which Smith was killed. Crosby, in turn, relayed information regarding Smith's routine to the triggerman, in the days and minutes leading up to the killing in order to provide the shooter with his routine. The surveillance videotape, containing footage of Smith from July 13-16, 2001, ended approximately 20 minutes prior to his shooting.
Following a two-year joint investigation conducted by the FBI, ATF, NYPD and IRS, McGriff was charged with murder in aid of racketeering in a sweeping indictment on January 26, 2005 -- murder-for-hire charges were eventually added to the indictment as well. Both McGriff and Victor Wright were charged with narcotics distribution and murder. Dennis "Divine" Crosby and Nicole Brown were added to the indictment for their part in Eric Smith's shooting death. Eventually, McGriff and Emanuel "Dog" Mosley were charged with murder in connection with the deaths of both Smith and Smith-associate, Tony "Big Nose" Singleton. On January 26, 2005, McGriff and employees of the record label Murder Inc., including CEO Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo, his brother and company vice president Christopher "Chris Gotti" Lorenzo, rapper Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins' manager Ronald "Gutta" Robinson, and company bookkeeper Cynthia Brent were charged with laundering over $1 million of McGriff's narcotics profits through the label and the film Crime Partners and its accompanying soundtrack. The indictment also sought the forfeiture of any and all assets of Murder Inc. Records, McGriff, the Lorenzos, Robinson and Brent.
Former Supreme Team member Philip "Dalu" Banks, who'd been incarcerated from 1997 to 2004, was arrested on February 17, 2005, for assault, credit card fraud and weapons charges. Banks agreed to testify against McGriff in exchange for leniency.
On September 21, 2005, Cynthia Brent pleaded guilty to a minor financial crime in exchange for the dismissal of her money laundering charges. Ronald Robinson pleaded guilty to tax evasion in exchange for the dismissal of his money laundering charges. During the money-laundering trial, former McGriff-associate Jon Ragin testified for the prosecution that McGriff admitted responsibility for Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson's near-fatal shooting to him. Ragin testified that McGriff allegedly told him, "I got him...they caught him coming out of his grandmother's house and he got into a car, and that's when he got shot...there was lots of blood." Ragin, however, was never cross-examined by defense attorneys, who successfully lobbied the court to have Jackson's shooting disregarded as irrelevant. After a three-week trial that featured celebrities such as Russell Simmons, Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter, Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins, Joseph "Fat Joe" Cartagena and Ashanti Douglas in the audience, Murder Inc. Records founders Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo and Christopher Lorenzo, who were tried separately from McGriff, were acquitted on all counts of money laundering on December 2, 2005. Christopher Lorenzo was represented by famed "mob lawyer" Gerald Shargel, whose current and former client list includes: drug kingpin James "Jimmy Henchman" Rosemond; racketeer James Coonan; heroin kingpin Johnny "Machinegun Johnny" Eng; actress Amanda Bynes; and mafia figures Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano, John Gott, Jr., and mob boss John Gotti.
That same year, Supreme Team lieutenant Ronald "Tuck" Tucker was released from FCI Gilmer (Federal Correctional Institute, Gilmer), a medium-security federal prison located near Glenville, West Virginia.
On March 22, 2006, prosecutors notified McGriff, Victor Wright, Dennis "Divine" Crosby, Nicole Brown and Emanuel "Dog" Mosley that they were seeking the death penalty for each of them. On April 4th, the death penalty motions were withdrawn for all but McGriff.
In the weeks leading up to his trial, McGriff was removed from general population and placed in administrative detention in the Special Housing Unit (SHU) while he was held without bail at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York after being charged with possessing cellphone SIM cards in the facility.
During the trial, which began January 8, 2007, prosecutors alleged that between 1997 and 2003, what they labeled "the McGriff Enterprise" distributed more than 150 kilograms of cocaine, 30 kilograms of heroin and 1.5 kilograms of crack. Emanuel Mosley testified in Brooklyn Federal Court that he murdered Eric Smith and three months later, Tony Singleton, at a Jamaica, Queens sports bar, at McGriff's behest, for $25,000 each. Mosley aslo testified that McGriff had also paid him to murder original Supreme Team member Nathan "Green Eyed Born" May, who ultimately eluded his would-be killer. Following a three-week trial and three days of jury deliberations, McGriff was convicted of conspiracy to distribute narcotics, racketeering and murder conspiracy on February 1, 2007. Though the prosecution pushed for the death penalty, McGriff was sentenced to life in prison without parole on February 9.
McGriff was initially imprisoned at the ADX (Administrative Maximum Facility) Florence supermax federal prison in Fremont County, Colorado which also houses other high-profile inmates such as: convicted drug kingpins Larry Hoover, Jeff Fort and Kaboni Savage; former FBI agent Robert Hanssen; Oklahoma City bomber Terry Nichols; the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski; Al-Qaeda members Zacarias Moussaoui, Mohamed Al-Owhali and "the Shoe Bomber", Richard Reid. Former inmates include: mobsters Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravana, Nicodemo "Little Nicky" Scarfo; Timothy McVeigh; and Mutulu Shakur.
Since 2011, McGriff has been imprisoned at the USP Lee (United States Penitentiary, Lee) maximum-security federal prison located in Pennington Gap, Virginia.
According to court records, "Tucker, Coleman, and David Robinson would deliver to the apartment the moneys received at the retail spots they supervised; Miller and the Team's primary drug courier Tent "Serious" Morris would negotiate cocaine deals by telephone with William Graham, a supplier who had Colombian connections; and Morris and Raymond Robinson would then drive to Graham's apartment with money to purchase kilogram-quantities of cocaine. The cocaine would be brought back to the Robinson apartment, where it was processed as crack, packaged, and given to Arroyo, David Robinson, Tucker, or Coleman, who in turn arranged for its sale by street-level employees."
In July of 1989, Miller, Arroyo, Hale, Hunt and Jimenez robbed four Colombian suppliers of two kilos of cocaine and subsequently murdered them. That August, Gus Rivera, the Supreme Team member who'd introduced the suppliers to Miller, was non-fatally shot in the head by Hunt in a Baisley Park courtyard. Hale and Arroyo subsequently shot Rivera to death in a Queens motel room.
That same month, organization members murdered two more suppliers after robbing them of their cocaine. When Colombian drug traffickers Pablo Perlaza and Fernando Suarez showed up to Hale's Baisley Park apartment for a pre-arranged transaction, Julio Hernandez held them at gunpoint while Hale and Arroyo bound the two with duct tape and tied plastic bags over their heads. Hale then proceeded to beat them with a baseball bat.
Also in 1989, McGriff pleaded guilty to engaging in a Continuing Criminal Enterprise (CCE). He was represented by famed defense attorney Robert Simels, who engineered a plea agreement that resulted in a 12-year sentence for McGriff instead of the potential 150 years he faced. Simels' client list also included southeast Queens drug kingpins Tommy "Tony Montana" Mickens and Lorenzo "Fat Cat" Nichols; teenaged heroin kingpin "Boy George" Rivera; mob informant Henry Hill, the inspiration for the lead character in the film Goodfellas; and former New York Jets star football players Ken O'Brien and Mark Gastineau. Simels himself was convicted of witness tampering in 2009 and sentenced to a 14-year prison sentence.
Julio Hernandez was arrested by federal agents in February of 1990. In March, several other members of the organization were arrested by the NYPD and charged with narcotics trafficking by the Queens County District Attorney's Office. Supreme Team member Trent Morris agreed to be a cooperating witness for the state of New York at Miller's trial and his wife and child were relocated out of concern for their safety.
In November of 1991, both Gerald Miller and organization member William Graham won motions to suppress tapes of conversations gathered from wiretaps on their home telephones. The state court cited false statements on the warrant applications for the wiretaps and the cases were dismissed. In December, Graham was indicted for three counts of narcotics trafficking and was eventually convicted in federal court, which allowed the wiretap evidence, and given a 30-year sentence. In January, Miller and 11 others were indicted by a federal grand jury. Miller's 10 counts included charges for narcotics trafficking, racketeering and witness intimidation.
Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff and Howard "Pappy" Mason
at the Olympia Palace in 1983
Miller's trial began on April 26, 1993, and featured 80 prosecution witnesses, including: Ernesto Piniella; Julio Hernandez; Trent Morris; Gus Rivera's girlfriend, Toni McGee; and Ina McGriff. The government also introduced tapes and transcripts of over 100 wiretapped conversations between organization members into evidence. Among other things, prosecutors detailed how Ina McGriff furnished organization members with fake IDs, ammunition and confidential parole information.
The government also illustrated how Miller aided drug kingpin Lorenzo Nichols in two shootings, one of which resulted in the death of the victim. According to testimony from Ina McGriff and Ernesto Piniella, Miller paid McGriff and her secretary, Ronnie Younger, $3,000 in exchange for providing the addresses of brothers Isaac and Henry Bolden, whom Nichols, who was incarcerated at the time, suspected of robbing his organization. After the information was given to members of Nichols' organization, Isaac Bolden was shot to death near his mother's home. Henry Bolden was shot at his home in the Bronx.
On June 21, Miller was found guilty of seven counts, including drug trafficking, narcotics conspiracy, running a continuing criminal enterprise, racketeering and murder. Several other Supreme Team members were found guilty at the trial as well. Ronald "Tuck" Tucker was sentenced to 14 years in prison. David "Bing" Robinson was convicted of drug trafficking and racketeering and sentenced to 15 years. Shannon Jimenez was convicted of narcotics conspiracy and sentenced to 30 years in prison and Harry "Big C" Hunt was given two concurrent life sentences. Roy Hale, who'd agreed to cooperate with authorities prior to the trial and subsequently changed his mind, was also given two concurrent life sentences. In addition to drug trafficking and racketeering convictions, Wilfredo "C-Justice" Arroyo was also found guilty of three counts of murder and sentenced to six concurrent life terms. All seven were convicted of conspiracy to distribute, and to possession with intent to distribute, cocaine base and all except Jimenez were convicted of violating the RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization) Act, though Miller's narcotics conspiracy conviction was reversed on appeal. Waverly "Teddy" Coleman and Raymond Robinson were tried separately from Miller and the others. Coleman was sentenced to 13 years in prison and Robinson was sentenced to 19 years in prison after being convicted of drug trafficking and racketeering.
Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff and
Gerald "Prince" Miller
Kenneth McGriff was granted early parole in 1994. McGriff was released to his father's home in South Jamaica where he organized a business selling pictures of nude women to inmates. Following a parole violation after his release, he was ordered back to prison that same year and served another 2 years and 6 months. Also, that same year, Supreme Team lieutenant James "Bimmy" Antney was freed when his $2 million bail was paid by R&B stars Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown. Due in no small part to his relationship with childhood friend and Hollis, Queens neighbor, rapper James "LL Cool J" Todd Smith, Antney would go on to have a successful career in the music industry, most notably as an A&R at Def Jam Records. He served as executive producer on rapper Richard "Slick Rick" Walter's gold album The Art of Storytelling and LL Cool J's chart-topping G.O.A.T. and G.O.A.T. 2. Antney's nephew is rapper Juaquin "Waka Flocka Flame" Malphurs and his sister is successful music manager Debra Antney, whose clients include her son, Malphurs, Radric "Gucci Mane" Davis, Karim "French Montana" Kharbouch and Onika "Nicki Minaj" Maraj.
On May 12, 1995, Gerald "Prince" Miller was sentenced to seven concurrent life terms in federal prison, plus a 20-year term to be served concurrently with his life terms.
On April 8, 1998, a four-month undercover investigation culminated in a late-night raid of the Baisly Park Houses conducted by the NYPD and Queens District Attorney's office. The raid resulted in the arrests of 24 members of the Supreme Team, including long-time member Damon Kearsley. Besides Kearsley, the 24 men and women arrested on drug charges included his older sister Dionne, Audrey Lee, Damon Belk, Andrew Hobson, Javier and Gabriel Reyes and Mark Haynes. Troy Smith and William Gillard were arrested on weapons charges. The organization is estimated to have generated revenue in excess of $500,000 per year from the sale of crack, cocaine and marijuana prior to the arrests.
On December 11, 1999, long-time Supreme Team lieutenant Colbert "Black Just" Johnson was shot to death by rival drug trafficker and aspiring rapper Eric "E-Moneybags" Smith. Surveillance footage showed Johnson's body being dropped off at a local hospital by another man driving an SUV, widely believed to be McGriff, hours after Smith shot Johnson in the leg. Smith was shot to death himself seven months later on July 16, while talking on a cell phone and sitting in his Lincoln Navigator on 111th Road in Queens Village, Queens. Smith was hit with 10 of the 40 shots fired into his vehicle. He was found with a loaded gun next to his foot.
Colbert "Black Just" Johnson and rapper Nasir "Nas" Jones
On August 24, 2001, authorities raided a stash house in Owings Mills, Maryland linked to McGriff and seized crack, cocaine, heroin, a stolen Ruger 9mm handgun, $30,000 cash and videotapes. Police also found a certificate, under one of McGriff's aliases, for the completion of a handgun training course in nearby Glen Burnie, Maryland. The raid followed the double murder of McGriff associate Karon Russell "Buddha" Clarett and Dwayne Thomas that occurred in the parking lot outside of the stash house, located at the Red Run Apartments complex, two days earlier. Investigators alleged that another of McGriff's business associates, Victor Wright, murdered Clarrett because McGriff suspected him of deciding to cooperate with investigators following his arrest four months prior in North Carolina, during which he was found with two kilograms of cocaine . It's believed that Thomas was murdered in order to eliminate him as a potential witness. Wright and McGriff associate Vash-ti Paylor were charged with drug trafficking following the raid. Wright was also charged with murder. McGriff was subsequently arrested at the Loews Hotel located in the ritzy Miami Beach, Florida neighborhood South Beach, and charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, on December 28, 2002. On June 2, 2003, he was sentenced to 37 months in federal prison after pleading guilty. Around the same time, he was facing pending New York state gun charges stemming from a July 2001 traffic stop in Harlem, during which he was found with $10,000 cash, a driver's license registered to an alias and a loaded .40-caliber handgun in his waistband after police pulled over his BMW.
On January 3, 2003, the FBI and NYPD executed a raid on the offices of the successful rap label, Murder Inc. Records, which generated $200 million from 1999 - 2003. Though no one was arrested, agents seized hard drives, laptops and business documents in an attempt to find evidence of the company laundering money in collusion with McGriff. McGriff reportedly forged a friendship with Murder Inc. Records founder and fellow Queens-native Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo and his brother Christopher "Chris Gotti" Lorenzo, in 1994, following an introduction at a music video shoot in South Jamaica, after his release from prison. At the time, Lorenzo was employed as an A&R rep for TVT Records. The raid was in connection to a probe launched by the U.S. attorney's office in Brookly, NY. McGriff made a cameo appearance alongside Lorenzo in the music video for rapper Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins' song "Murda 4 Life".
March 25, 2003, marked the DVD release of the McGriff-produced film Crime Partners, featuring rappers Tracy "Ice-T" Marrow, Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins, Calvin "Snoop Doggy Dogg" Broadus, Taheem "Cadillac Tah" Crocker and Tiffany "Charli Baltimore" Lane. In 1998, McGriff collaborated with Chaz "Slim" Williams in an effort to secure the rights to produce a film adaptation of the 1972 Donald Goines novel, "Black Gangster." Though that film was never produced, McGriff secured the rights to Goines' 1974 novel "Crime Partners" in 2002 and the movie was produced through his company, Picture Perfect Films.
That same year, McGriff's nephew, Lawrence "Wise" McGriff, was released after serving a 16-year sentence in prison. He is now vice president of marketing and promotion and vice president of A&R for Universal Def Jam Records.
A 2003 affidavit by IRS investigators revealed that federal agents suspected McGriff of ordering the murder of rapper Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson, which resulted in his near-fatal shooting in Jamaica, Queens on May 25, 2000. The affivadit attributes McGriff's alleged motive to his having been angered by Jackson's song, "Ghetto Qu'ran", in which he discusses McGriff's criminal past. Jackson's crack-addicted mother, Sabrina, is believed to have sold cocaine for the Supreme Team at the time of her murder at the age of 23 in 1984. Jackson has stated publicly that his mother was asphyxiated when someone drugged her drink, causing her to lose consciousness, and subsequently closed all the windows before turning on the gas in her apartment.
In March of 2004, the government ordered the seizure of all assets of McGriff's companies, Picture Perfect Films and Picture Perfect Entertainment, including all proceeds of Crime Partners, including DVD and soundtrack sales.
McGriff lieutenant Dennis "Divine" Crosby and his girlfriend Nicole Brown were charged with murder in aid of racketeering on November 18, 2004, when investigators alleged that one of the videotapes confiscated during the Maryland stash house raid contained surveillance footage of Eric "E-Moneybags" Smith taken by the two from Brown's apartment, located on the same street on which Smith was killed. Crosby, in turn, relayed information regarding Smith's routine to the triggerman, in the days and minutes leading up to the killing in order to provide the shooter with his routine. The surveillance videotape, containing footage of Smith from July 13-16, 2001, ended approximately 20 minutes prior to his shooting.
Following a two-year joint investigation conducted by the FBI, ATF, NYPD and IRS, McGriff was charged with murder in aid of racketeering in a sweeping indictment on January 26, 2005 -- murder-for-hire charges were eventually added to the indictment as well. Both McGriff and Victor Wright were charged with narcotics distribution and murder. Dennis "Divine" Crosby and Nicole Brown were added to the indictment for their part in Eric Smith's shooting death. Eventually, McGriff and Emanuel "Dog" Mosley were charged with murder in connection with the deaths of both Smith and Smith-associate, Tony "Big Nose" Singleton. On January 26, 2005, McGriff and employees of the record label Murder Inc., including CEO Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo, his brother and company vice president Christopher "Chris Gotti" Lorenzo, rapper Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins' manager Ronald "Gutta" Robinson, and company bookkeeper Cynthia Brent were charged with laundering over $1 million of McGriff's narcotics profits through the label and the film Crime Partners and its accompanying soundtrack. The indictment also sought the forfeiture of any and all assets of Murder Inc. Records, McGriff, the Lorenzos, Robinson and Brent.
Former Supreme Team member Philip "Dalu" Banks, who'd been incarcerated from 1997 to 2004, was arrested on February 17, 2005, for assault, credit card fraud and weapons charges. Banks agreed to testify against McGriff in exchange for leniency.
On September 21, 2005, Cynthia Brent pleaded guilty to a minor financial crime in exchange for the dismissal of her money laundering charges. Ronald Robinson pleaded guilty to tax evasion in exchange for the dismissal of his money laundering charges. During the money-laundering trial, former McGriff-associate Jon Ragin testified for the prosecution that McGriff admitted responsibility for Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson's near-fatal shooting to him. Ragin testified that McGriff allegedly told him, "I got him...they caught him coming out of his grandmother's house and he got into a car, and that's when he got shot...there was lots of blood." Ragin, however, was never cross-examined by defense attorneys, who successfully lobbied the court to have Jackson's shooting disregarded as irrelevant. After a three-week trial that featured celebrities such as Russell Simmons, Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter, Jeffrey "Ja Rule" Atkins, Joseph "Fat Joe" Cartagena and Ashanti Douglas in the audience, Murder Inc. Records founders Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo and Christopher Lorenzo, who were tried separately from McGriff, were acquitted on all counts of money laundering on December 2, 2005. Christopher Lorenzo was represented by famed "mob lawyer" Gerald Shargel, whose current and former client list includes: drug kingpin James "Jimmy Henchman" Rosemond; racketeer James Coonan; heroin kingpin Johnny "Machinegun Johnny" Eng; actress Amanda Bynes; and mafia figures Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano, John Gott, Jr., and mob boss John Gotti.
Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter and Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff
That same year, Supreme Team lieutenant Ronald "Tuck" Tucker was released from FCI Gilmer (Federal Correctional Institute, Gilmer), a medium-security federal prison located near Glenville, West Virginia.
On March 22, 2006, prosecutors notified McGriff, Victor Wright, Dennis "Divine" Crosby, Nicole Brown and Emanuel "Dog" Mosley that they were seeking the death penalty for each of them. On April 4th, the death penalty motions were withdrawn for all but McGriff.
In the weeks leading up to his trial, McGriff was removed from general population and placed in administrative detention in the Special Housing Unit (SHU) while he was held without bail at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York after being charged with possessing cellphone SIM cards in the facility.
During the trial, which began January 8, 2007, prosecutors alleged that between 1997 and 2003, what they labeled "the McGriff Enterprise" distributed more than 150 kilograms of cocaine, 30 kilograms of heroin and 1.5 kilograms of crack. Emanuel Mosley testified in Brooklyn Federal Court that he murdered Eric Smith and three months later, Tony Singleton, at a Jamaica, Queens sports bar, at McGriff's behest, for $25,000 each. Mosley aslo testified that McGriff had also paid him to murder original Supreme Team member Nathan "Green Eyed Born" May, who ultimately eluded his would-be killer. Following a three-week trial and three days of jury deliberations, McGriff was convicted of conspiracy to distribute narcotics, racketeering and murder conspiracy on February 1, 2007. Though the prosecution pushed for the death penalty, McGriff was sentenced to life in prison without parole on February 9.
McGriff was initially imprisoned at the ADX (Administrative Maximum Facility) Florence supermax federal prison in Fremont County, Colorado which also houses other high-profile inmates such as: convicted drug kingpins Larry Hoover, Jeff Fort and Kaboni Savage; former FBI agent Robert Hanssen; Oklahoma City bomber Terry Nichols; the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski; Al-Qaeda members Zacarias Moussaoui, Mohamed Al-Owhali and "the Shoe Bomber", Richard Reid. Former inmates include: mobsters Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravana, Nicodemo "Little Nicky" Scarfo; Timothy McVeigh; and Mutulu Shakur.
Since 2011, McGriff has been imprisoned at the USP Lee (United States Penitentiary, Lee) maximum-security federal prison located in Pennington Gap, Virginia.
Luc “Spoon” Stephen, Corley, Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff
and Howard "Pappy" Mason at the Olympia Palace in Queens 1983
and Howard "Pappy" Mason at the Olympia Palace in Queens 1983
Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff and Gerald "Prince" Miller
Ja Rule and Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff
Kenneth "Supreme" McGriff and James "Bimmy"
Antney (back seat)
Run-DMC and James "Bimmy" Antney
James "Bimmy" Antney (far left) and Colbert "Black Just"
Johnson (far right)
Supreme and Green Eyed Born
Eric "E-Moneybags" Smith
Irving "Irv Gotti" Lorenzo
Supreme's nephew Lawrence "Wise" McGriff
Lorenzo "Fat Cat" Nichols and Kenneth "Supreme"
McGriff
Ja Rule's "Uh Oh" music video featuring
Supreme Team t-shirts
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