Rapper's Entourage Indicted For Wild Chase Through Harlem: DA

HARLEM, NY — Five members of the security team for rapper Tekashi 6ix9ine were indicted Monday for allegedly chasing a man through Harlem last summer using sirens and flashing lights, then lying to police about what happened.

The group of five men, which includes a former NYPD detective, face charges including robbery and criminal impersonation stemming from the Aug. 9, 2020 incident, which began when a 34-year-old man started filming the rapper as he drove through Harlem.

6ix9ine, whose real name is Daniel Hernandez, had been released from house arrest days earlier after a prison stint on racketeering, drug and weapons charges. He surrounded himself with a crew of ex-law enforcement officers, looking to protect himself amid threats that followed his 2019 court testimony against former gang associates.

After Hernandez and his crew noticed the man trying to record him using his cell phone, they shouted at him and started chasing him as he drove away, according to prosecutors.

They followed the man for about 20 blocks in three SUVs decked out with sirens and flashing lights, prosecutors said. At one point, they flagged down a police car and one of the security workers — retired detective Daniel Laperuta, 44 — told officers that the man had threatened them with a gun before rejoining the chase, prosecutors said.

As the chase continued, Laperuta called 911 and again claimed that the man had threatened the group with a gun.

Finally, at the corner of West 125th Street and Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard, the entourage boxed in the man's car and forced him to pull over. Another team member, Sammy Sprouse, opened the man's car door, unbuckled his seatbelt and pulled his arm, knocking the man's phone out of his hand and onto the ground, authorities said.

Another worker stomped on the phone as the man struggled with a fourth security member as he tried to recover it, prosecutors said. Laperuta then walked up with his hand on a holstered gun while another worker pointed a taser at the man, prosecutors said.

The fight broke up after an unmarked NYPD car approached with flashing lights, prompting the entourage to get back in their SUVs and flee, authorities said.

Later, Laperuta went to the NYPD's 28th Precinct in Harlem to make a complaint, again claiming that the man had taken out a gun. But an NYPD lieutenant "confronted Laperuta about the improbability of his account," causing him to withdraw the complaint and leave, prosecutors said.

Laperuta faced seven accusations of misconduct during his NYPD career for three separate incidents, according to NYPD records. Two of those were substantiated: an improper frisk and vehicle search in Manhattan in 2009, for which Laperuta was disciplined.

"A celebrity entourage is not a police department, and Manhattan is not the Wild West," District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr. said in a statement.

"As alleged, these highly-compensated vigilantes caravanned through the streets of Harlem with sirens flashing in order to track a man down and steal and break his phone," he added. "Along the way, a retired NYPD Detective tried to cover up their conduct by lying to his former colleagues and repeatedly claiming the victim had threatened to shoot them."

The Harlem chase made news in hip-hop publications last summer. XXL magazine reported on footage showing the man appearing to taunt 6ix9ine as a bystander pleads, "Give him his phone."

Laperuta, who now lives upstate, faces two charges of robbery, as well as criminal impersonation and falsely reporting an incident. Fellow security members Sammy Sprouse, Christian Cortez, Edgardo Cortez and Kristian Fuhse are also named in Monday's indictment.

Hernandez, 25, is not facing any charges himself.