NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — Five members of Tekashi 6ix9ine’s private security team — one of whom is a former NYPD detective — have been charged with robbing a man of his phone after he tried to take a video of the rapper in Harlem last year, prosecutors say.
Former NYPD Detective Daniel Laperuta, 44, of Central Valley; Sammy Sprouse, of Tennessee; Christian Cortez and Egardo Cortez, both of Bridgeport, Connecticut; and Kristian Fuhse, of Florida have all been indicted for robbery and criminal impersonation, the Manhattan District Attorney’s office said Monday.
Prosecutors say Tekashi 6ix9ine, a Brooklyn-born rapper whose real name is Daniel Hernandez, was driving in Harlem with his security team on Aug. 9 last year when a 34-year-old man spotted him and tried to record a video on his phone.
When Hernandez’ security team saw the man filming, they started yelling at him and began to tail him as he drove off, according to prosecutors.
Hernandez’ entourage followed the man for around 20 blocks in three SUVs equipped with flashing lights and sirens, prosecutors said.
When the man tried to flag down a police car, Laperuta flashed his retired NYPD Member of Service card and told the officers the man had threatened them with a gun, according to prosecutors.
Hernandez’ team eventually boxed the man’s car into a corner at Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard and 125th Street, at which point Sprouse pulled the man out of his vehicle and stomped on his phone, prosecutors said.
When the man tried to pick up the remains of his phone, Laperuta approached him with his hand on his gun and Christian Cortez pointed a Taser at him as Egardo Cortez wrestled with him, according to prosecutors.
“A celebrity entourage is not a police department, and Manhattan is not the Wild West,” District Attorney Cyrus 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.”
“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,” he added. “False reports — especially about firearms — can carry devastating consequences, and fortunately, no one was injured or killed in the actual police response.”
Attorney information for the five security team members wasn’t immediately available Monday.
A judge last April ordered that Hernandez be freed from a Manhattan federal lockup four months early due to “heightened medical risk presented to [the rapper] by the COVID-19 pandemic.”
Hernandez’ testimony against members of the Nine Trey Gansta Bloods gang earned him leniency from charges that could have subjected him to a mandatory minimum 37 years in prison for crimes that included orchestrating a shooting in which an innocent bystander was wounded.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.