Suspected arson at Bayer executive’s home being investigated by FBI: Sources
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(MADISON, N.J.) — The FBI is now involved in the investigation into a suspected arson earlier this month at the New Jersey home of a Bayer pharmaceutical executive, law enforcement sources told ABC News.
At approximately 7:30 a.m. on March 4, a fire was reported at an occupied, private residence in Madison, New Jersey, according to the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office.
The Madison Fire Department was able to quickly extinguish the flames and the structure “sustained no significant damage and there were no reported injuries,” according to the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office.
“The safety and security of our employees are of utmost importance to Bayer. The incident is under active investigation. We appreciate the quick response of local law enforcement,” Bayer said in a statement.
There have been no arrests related to the incident, officials said.
Bayer’s headquarters is located in nearby Hanover Township, New Jersey. The pharmaceutical company is known for products like Aleve and Alka-Seltzer.
The New York Police Department, Metropolitan Transportation Authority Police and New Jersey Transit Police are also part of the investigation.
The FBI’s Newark office declined to comment about its role in investigating the fire.
This suspected arson comes at a time of heightened concern in the health care industry following the December murder of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
Individuals mobilized by economic grievances are taking Thompson’s murder as inspiration for threats and attack plotting, expanding their target set to include government and public safety officials, according to a Homeland Security report obtained by ABC News.
“Within days of the late December murder of a health insurance CEO, we observed online threats targeting high-profile executives. In the past several weeks, some threats citing similar grievances and referencing the CEO’s murder as inspiration are now targeting federal, state and local government officials,” the document said.
A growing amount of Americans feel hostility toward prominent chief executives, with a 2023 Ipsos survey finding that more than two-thirds of Americans think the nation’s economy is rigged to the advantage of the rich and powerful.
Similarly, a 2022 Pew survey found that only 1 in 4 adults believed large businesses have a positive effect on the way things are going in the country.
(WASHINGTON) — The Securities and Exchange Commission is continuing its $150 million lawsuit against Elon Musk that was brought during the Biden administration.
According to a court filing Monday, the tech billionaire and head of the Department of Government Efficiency has agreed to respond to the suit, which accuses him of misleading investors when he bought millions of dollars in Twitter stock in 2022, prior to his acquisition of the company.
The SEC brought the case against Musk on Jan. 14 in the waning days of the Biden administration, and a representative of the SEC served Musk with the complaint and a summons earlier this month — though Musk contests the validity of the service.
Under the terms of the agreement, Musk’s lawyers will file a response to the complaint by June 6, pending approval from the court.
“The parties respectfully submit that this compromise is reasonable and will conserve judicial resources,” the filing said.
Monday’s filing marks the first time a deadline for Musk to respond to the complaint has been raised by either party.
Musk’s lawyers could not immediately be reached for comment by ABC News.
“They spend their time on s— like this when there are so many actual crimes that go unpunished,” Musk said on X in January in response to the SEC’s suit.
The only man ever charged in the notorious Las Vegas murder of rapper Tupac Shakur insists he is “innocent,” being railroaded by authorities and that he only confessed to his purported role in the crime because he was getting paid to lie.
In his first interview since being arrested in September 2023, Duane “Keffe D” Davis told ABC News in a jailhouse interview that he should be at home, watching his grandchildren grow up and tending to his garden. Instead, he said, he’s being forced to stand trial in a nearly three-decade-old case that’s devoid of concrete evidence.
“I’m innocent,” Davis said during a sometimes-tearful hour-long meeting at the Clark County Detention Center. He described himself as a “good man” long retired from the drug game he once excelled at.
“I did everything they asked me to do. Get new friends. Stop selling drugs. I stopped all that,” he said, referring to police and prosecutors. “I’m supposed to be out there enjoying my twilight at one of my f—— grandson’s football games, and basketball games. Enjoying life with my kids.”
Prosecutors say Davis, 61, was a longtime member and leader of a set of the infamous Crips street gang based in his hometown of Compton, California. Authorities say that, as the alleged “shot caller” on the night of Shakur’s killing in September 1996, it was Davis who orchestrated the drive-by shooting of the rap star off the Vegas strip. On their way from Mike Tyson’s fight against Bruce Seldon, Shakur was gunned down at a red light in the passenger seat of the BMW being driven by rap impresario Marion “Suge” Knight. Shakur was rushed to the hospital and died six days later from his wounds.
Though the killing occurred on the bustling streets of Sin City – it remained unsolved for nearly 30 years, mired in police scandals and turf wars, and a street code that frowns upon snitches.
Eventually, Vegas detectives built their case off Davis’ own account of the killing, retold in multiple police interviews, public media appearances before his arrest, and a 2019 self-published memoir with his own name on it.
Davis’ previous words copping to his role in the rapper’s killing are crucial in the case against him. Investigators say they spent years working to beef up Davis’ narrative of the events by using evidence and additional accounts to firm up their case – expected to be presented to a jury in 11 months.
Davis, sitting on a wooden bench under the harsh fluorescent lights of a jailhouse conference room and accompanied by corrections officers, now insists he didn’t write his own memoir – and hasn’t even read it. And so, he says, those confessions aren’t worth the paper they’re printed on.
“I’ve never read the book,” Davis said of his memoir “Compton Street Legend,” on which he shares the credit as a co-author. The back of the book bears the tagline, “The last living eyewitness to Tupac’s murder is telling his story.”
Davis says his co-author took artistic liberties he had nothing to do with.
“I just gave him details of my life,” Davis said. “And he went and did his little investigation and wrote the book on his own.”
Not only does he say he had nothing to do with Shakur’s killing, Davis said he was hundreds of miles away from where it happened – asserting for the first time where he says he was that night: “in Los Angeles,” and at home.
Davis said he has “about 20 or 30 people going to come” to his murder trial corroborating that alibi – to say nothing of the “13,000 people who say they killed Tupac.” He did not name the people who he said woukld verify where he was the night that Shakur was killed.
“I did not do it,” Davis said of what had stood as one of the best-known cold cases in modern American history. Of prosecutors leading the case against him, he said “They don’t have nothing. And they know they don’t have nothing. They can’t even place me out here. They don’t have no gun, no car, no Keffe D, no nothing.”
Las Vegas prosecutors declined to respond directly to Davis’ comments but continue to insist they are confident in the case and expect to see the man convicted at trial.
In 2008, Davis confessed to his purported role in the Shakur homicide in an interview with detectives connected to a joint federal-Los Angeles task force that had set up a drug operation sting on Davis to extract information on fellow rap icon Biggie Smalls’ murder, which happened six months after Shakur’s. Davis at the time said he didn’t have information about Biggie’s murder — but did have other information that would be valuable. That time, according to police, Davis made his admissions as part of what’s known as a “proffer agreement,” so he could not be prosecuted for what he said.
The following year, Davis again confirmed his purported role in the Shakur drive-by this time in an interview with detectives from Las Vegas. Vegas authorities were not connected to the earlier sessions, and were not required to honor any agreement that might have been made with Davis, according to interview recordings and transcripts reviewed by ABC. The only thing Vegas cops agreed to was that the interview with Davis would be voluntary and he would not be arrested on the spot.
At the time, some Las Vegas detectives wanted to bust Davis and charge him with the Tupac murder, but prosecutors feared that both sets of alleged confessions could be thrown out of court because of the purported non-prosecution agreement in LA. If a judge were to side with Davis, the case would likely have been doomed.
Davis’ lawyers did make that argument earlier this year and the judge rejected it. But the issue was largely beside the point because, officials have said, Davis went on to publicly recount his purported role in the homicide repeatedly in the years since 2009, especially in a 2018 docuseries and on the pages of “Compton Street Legends.”
Davis’ own public words “reinvigorates the investigation,” the now-retired head of the Las Vegas homicide bureau, Jason Johansson, told ABC last year.
Sitting in jail, Davis said that version of events was totally fabricated for profit when he told his story in the media. As for making his purported confession to the authorities, he said, that was a play to keep others caught up in a drug case out of prison. He said he told police what they wanted to hear “if they let me go.”
“That’s the only way you’re walking free,” Davis said, recounting the choice he felt he had to make. “It would’ve been selfish to let everybody go down because of me.”
As for the similar versions of events recounted by him on camera, before his arrest, and in the book with his name on it, Davis says that was just a financial investment.
“They paid me to say that,” he said.
Davis insists the 2008 non-prosecution agreement should still hold and that any statements to law enforcement connected with it should not be presented to the jury next year.
“I’m not even supposed to be in jail,” he said. “A deal is a deal.”
Davis also pointed the finger at an altogether different suspect: the former cop responsible for running some of the security operations for Knight and Shakur on the night of the shooting. That man, Reggie Wright Jr., a former Compton police officer, who testified before the grand jury that indicted Davis for the Shakur killing, ran security for Knight’s Death Row Records back in the mid-1990s. Wright has said he spent most of that night of the killing working out logistics at the club that Shakur and Knight were planning to visit after the Tyson fight.
Echoing a recent accusation lodged in court papers by his attorney, Davis now accuses Wright and his security team of having orchestrated the shooting that killed Shakur.
“Prove that I orchestrated this,” Davis said. “Their top witness is the lead suspect, Reggie Wright Jr.,” alleging both Wright and his onetime security company were “mercenaries.”
Wright has denied any involvement in Shakur’s killing – and points out he was there for exactly the opposite purpose that night.
“I was in charge of possibly protecting this young man,” Wright told ABC’s Nightline last year.
“It’s heartbreaking they keep dragging in my name,” Wright said reacting to Davis’ attorney’s recent allegations. “I didn’t have anything to do with that. One of the worst days of my life when I heard that that happened.”
Davis has repeatedly tried to make bail since he was arrested outside his home in Sept. 2023 but the judge refused to accept the financing packages he has put together. He now faces an additional charge and trial connected with a jailhouse fight with another inmate, set for April.
According to jailhouse surveillance footage obtained by ABC News, the man who fought with Davis appeared to have been waiting alone and unattended in a common area when Davis came walking through with an escort. The second inmate can be seen lunging at Davis, who fought back.
Both Davis and the other inmate have pleaded not guilty to charges of battery and challenging each other to fight. Davis said he was only defending himself. He has also pleaded not guilty to the murder charge.
He insists that he will eventually beat the rap on both the murder and battery charge and that he knows how to fight his way through.
“God got my back, and God will see me through this,” Davis said. “He had my back with cancer, I survived the streets, and the FBI. That’s a big accomplishment for a man from Compton.”
ABC News’ Kaitlyn Morris contributed to this report.
(LOUISIANA) — Police in Louisiana said Monday they are investigating the possibility that a sports reporter who had traveled to New Orleans to cover the Super Bowl may have been drugged before his death.
Adan Manzano, a reporter for KGKC Telemundo Kansas City and Tico Sports, was found dead in his hotel room in Kenner, Louisiana, on Feb. 5, police said. A cause and manner of death have not been released.
A woman who police said was seen going into Manzano’s hotel room hours before he was found dead allegedly had his cellphone and credit card in her home, according to the Kenner Police Department. The suspect — Danette Colbert, of Slidell, Louisiana — has been charged with property crimes, including theft and fraud-related offenses, police said.
Amid the ongoing investigation into Manzano’s death, police said Monday that while they are still awaiting toxicology reports, which are expected to take several weeks, “investigators are exploring all available evidence in this case, including the possibility that Manzano may have been drugged before his death.”
“Colbert has an arrest history that includes similar allegations involving drugging individuals to facilitate theft,” the Kenner Police Department said in a statement on Monday.
Since her arrest last week, the Kenner Police Department said it has been contacted by people “claiming to be victims or reporting suspicious deaths under similar circumstances.”
“All of these complaints will be referred to the appropriate jurisdictions for further investigation,” the department said.
Colbert was charged with robbery, access device fraud, illegal transmission of monetary funds, bank fraud and computer fraud in Jefferson Parish amid the investigation into Manzano’s death, police said.
Investigators are “working closely with forensic experts and the Jefferson Parish Coroner’s Office to determine whether additional charges may be warranted,” police said Monday.
Colbert remains in custody at the Jefferson Parish Correctional Center awaiting criminal proceedings, police said. It is unclear if she has an attorney.
Police are aware of two prior instances in Nevada and Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, in which Colbert was accused of drugging a victim and stealing his “access device cards and things of that nature,” Kenner Police Chief Keith Conley said at a press briefing last week.
“We’re going to let the evidence lead us to the end result and not speculate,” Conley said last week when asked whether they considered this a homicide investigation.
Surveillance video shows Manzano and Colbert at his hotel the morning of Feb. 5, police said. Colbert was seen leaving his room and coming back, then leaving again later that morning, police said.
Investigators have additionally identified locations where the two were seen together in New Orleans, police said Monday.
Investigators determined that Colbert used Manzano’s credit card at several stores in the New Orleans area, police said.
His cellphone and credit card were located inside her residence while deputies executed a search warrant and she was arrested on Thursday, police said.
KGKC Telemundo Kansas City remembered Manzano as a “true professional and a rising star.”
“We will deeply miss Adan and his passion for sports, and the contributions he made to the local community,” the station said.
