Akon's Con Job

Long article, but the jist of it is that this Deena-humping, 15yr-old-boy-pelting Somalian nigga is a big focking WANKSTA! What a focking fraud. What he need now is some real time in jail for some rednecks to tattoo SMACK DAT on his lower back and send him running naked through the jail showers. Focking ass.

The platinum-selling R&B artist has fabricated a past as
ringleader of a "notorious" car theft ring who spent 4 1/2 years in
jail.

In the hip-hop world, a performer's street cred can often be gauged
by the number of entries on their rap sheet, the time they have spent
behind bars, or the gritty details of their illicit escapades.

By any of those metrics, the chart-topping R&B singer Akon
appears to have compiled an exemplary outlaw resume, one brimming with
scrapes from a hard knock life.

As recounted in scores of interviews since his first album, the
platinum-selling "Trouble," debuted in 2004, Akon was incarcerated for
a total of four-and-a-half years, including a long stretch for his role
as the "ringleader of a notorious car theft operation." Akon's gang
specialized in boosting Porsches, Lamborghinis, and Mercedeses, he
owned four chop shops catering to "celebrities and drug dealers," and
he frequently escaped from cops in high-speed pursuits. His criminal
empire collapsed, though, after underlings--who "felt like they
deserved more than they were getting"--cut deals and ratted him out to
law enforcement. As a result of that betrayal, Akon spent the next
three years in a Georgia prison. While inside, the 150-pound inmate
"fought almost every day for two years," in the process becoming a
"champion" who prevailed over both big and small inmates because, "I
knew where to hit you to knock you out, so I didn't fear you."

When not brutally schooling fellow convicts, Akon was writing songs,
including "Locked Up," his autobiographical account of prison
desolation, from dwindling commissary accounts to friends and family
that no longer visited or accepted collect calls. The song, he
recalled, "was like an anthem in there" and corrections officers would
often ask him to sing its chorus ("I'm locked up/They won't let me
out"). After his release in 2002, Akon recorded "Locked Up," adding to
the song what would become his audio trademark: the clanging sound of a
cell door closing. The single later became a hit, but did little to
erase the memories of his time on lockdown, which "felt like 300 years,
not three."

Compared
to most of hip-hop's leading figures past and present--50 Cent, Snoop
Dogg, Eminem, Diddy, Tupac Shakur, Jay-Z, Notorious B.I.G.--Akon, 35,
seems to have logged more time behind bars and, consequently, gained a
better understanding of the average convict's plight (both in and out
of custody) than any of his musical peers. The New York Times has
referred to him as the "prison-obsessed R&B singer" who "wants it
known that crooners can evoke prison life just as effectively as
rappers." In fact, the singer not only named his company Konvict Music,
but he settled on "Konvicted" for the title of his second album, which
sold nearly three million copies last year.

As it turns out, however, "Kontrived" might have been a more accurate choice.

Akon's ad nauseum claims about his criminal career and resulting
prison time have been, to an overwhelming extent, exaggerated,
embellished, or wholly fabricated, an investigation by The Smoking Gun
has revealed. Police, court, and corrections records reveal that the
entertainer has created a fictionalized backstory that serves as the
narrative anchor for his recorded tales of isolation, violence, woe,
and regret. Akon has overdubbed his biography with the kind of grit and
menace that he apparently believes music consumers desire from their
hip-hop stars.

While the performer's rap sheet does include a half-dozen arrests,
Akon has only been convicted of one felony, for gun possession. That
1998 New Jersey case ended with a guilty plea, for which the singer was
sentenced to three years probation. Another 1998 bust, this one in
suburban Atlanta, has been seized upon by Akon and transformed into the
big case that purportedly sent him to prison (thanks to his snitching
cohorts) for three fight-filled years. In reality, Akon was arrested
for possession of a single stolen BMW and held in the DeKalb County
jail for several months before prosecutors dropped all charges against
him.

So there was no conviction. There was no prison term between 1999
and 2002. And he was never "facing 75 years," as the singer claimed in
one videotaped interview.

Akon's invented tales appear to be part of a cynical marketing plan,
but one that has met with remarkable success. Few press interviews
conclude without Akon being asked about his criminal exploits and his
prison days. He obliges with canned and well-rehearsed claims, false as
they may be, and compares his supposed nationwide operation to those
depicted in the movies "Gone in 60 Seconds" and "New Jersey Drive." And
in interview after interview over the years, he always makes sure to
point out the "notorious" nature of his theft ring (as if the
adjective's inclusion makes him sound even more felonious). Akon
repeats the phrase "notorious car theft operation" so frequently it
seems like he is reading it from a sheet of talking points.

[A compilation of video clips in which Akon touts his purported criminal past may be viewed above.]

Akon's manager, Robert Carnes, declined to discuss any aspect of the
criminal history of the R&B singer, who is currently touring in
Africa. Carnes directed a reporter to Sharonda Smalls, Akon's publicist
at Universal Motown Records. After being apprised of the nature of
TSG's story, Smalls said she would seek replies to our questions, but
had not called back at press time. Darrick "Devyne" Stephens, Akon's
longtime collaborator and business partner, did not return several
messages left at his Atlanta office.

Akon's deceptions have gone unchallenged and unexamined by the music
press, which has been happy to promote him as one of the beleaguered
recording industry's few bright lights. He was named "Top Artist of
2007" by Billboard and dubbed "The Last Hit-Maker" in an April 2007
Vibe cover story. His two albums combined have sold about 10 million
copies worldwide, while ring tone sales have exceeded 6.5 million
downloads. He has also collaborated on songs with a wide array of
musical superstars, including Gwen Stefani, Eminem, Michael Jackson,
and Whitney Houston.

With
the single exception of a Washington Post reporter who wrote last March
that some of the "bullet points in Akon's biography" sounded "like the
stuff of creation myth," entertainment journalists have played right
into the manipulation. In a February 2007 story in Creative Loafing,
Atlanta's weekly newspaper, readers were assured that "Akon doesn't
need to embellish, since he's already lived an unusual and turbulent
life." And an August 2007 Interview magazine story was headlined,
"Akon: In a hip-hop world where everyone's always straining for street
cred, here's one guy who has it."

For his part, the performer appears so confident that nobody will
challenge his fables that he has recently embellished them even
further. In an interview for a February 2008 episode of VH1's "Rags to
Riches," the R&B performer claimed that he actually was a carjacker
who "used to literally snatch cars from people. And they would be
traumatized for months." He claimed to be ashamed of this behavior
(which he never previously mentioned) and remarked that he could not
believe he once "had the heart to do that stuff." A VH1 graphic duly
noted that this wanton activity "landed him three years in prison for
carjacking."

This m.o., of course, might seem familiar to readers of these pages.
An artist inflates his criminal history to create an image of himself
as a public menace who tangles with law enforcement and pays for his
transgressions with a stiff prison sentence. He cleaves to these bogus
biographical details in public appearances and media interviews and
carefully weaves them into the art he peddles to the public. Because
without the embellishments and fabrications, without the havoc and
heartache, what separates him from every other wannabe clawing for
commercial success? Why chance having your work judged solely on its
merits when a little artistic license can make you so much more
distinctive and marketable?

Akon, as it turns out, is James Frey with catchy hooks and an American Music Award.

* * *

TSG
began examining Akon's criminal record after he was arraigned last
December on criminal charges stemming from an incident during a June
2007 concert at Dutchess Stadium in Fishkill, N.Y.. During that show,
Akon, whose given name is Aliaune Thiam, lifted a 15-year-old boy over
his head and tossed the child into the crowd. As seen on a
YouTube video,
Akon dispatched a security guard to bring the young fan, Anthony Smith,
on stage after a pretzel had been thrown at him from the audience
(fellow concertgoers apparently fingered the teenager as the culprit).
"He made a big mistake today, boy," Akon announced before flinging
Smith several rows into the crowd.

With the incident on tape, the singer was charged with harassment and endangering the welfare of a child.
Following a December 3 court appearance, Akon was released without bail
after a computer check turned up no outstanding warrants or, for that
matter, any prior criminal history. This seemed peculiar considering
the singer's frequent mentions of his prison time and assorted arrests.

A
second check was performed, with investigators submitting Akon's
fingerprints to the FBI for a more thorough search for warrants and
priors. This time, bureau records turned up six arrests for Akon, who
previously used several aliases and birthdates when being processed by
law enforcement agencies in New Jersey and Georgia. In light of the
discovery of the previous arrest history, prosecutors asked a town
judge to set Akon's bail at a nominal $5000, a request the jurist
denied.

Though he has claimed to have been frequently arrested while growing
up in a middle class household in New Jersey, Akon's rap sheet (and
court records) reflect no such cases. He told Vibe last year that he
sold marijuana and test questions from his high school locker and that
a friend named Tito got him his first gun, a .22. Which, Akon claimed,
he rented out for $100 a day. As he explained to VH1 in 2005, he was a
big deal back then: "I got accepted by the gangster crowd because they
saw that I wasn't afraid of nobody and I would fight anybody...Before I
knew it, I became the most popular kid in Jersey City as a good bad
guy." Though he lived in the suburbs, Akon told Vibe he "hung out in
the ghetto. The suburbs were just boring. We couldn't make any noise."

Born
in Missouri, Akon reportedly spent some of his youth is Senegal, where
his father, Mor Thiam, was a well-known percussionist. Akon apparently
moved with his family to Georgia in the mid-90s, though he would often
return to New Jersey, where he hung out with members and associates of
the Fugees. At the time, the singer was signed to Elektra Records and
was, according to copyright records, writing songs with Fugee Wyclef
Jean and Stephens, a choreographer and "image consultant" who would
later play a central role in Akon's platinum success.

It was after his deal with Elektra cratered that Akon ran into his first serious criminal trouble. In September 1998, he was named in a felony indictment charging him and codefendant Terrence Taylor with handgun possession and receiving stolen property (specifically, a 1998 BMW).

Burlington County Superior Court records indicate that Akon--who
was originally charged under the name Abou Thiam--was released from the
county lockup in Mount Holly after posting $3500 bond.

While free on the New Jersey case, he was arrested in mid-November 1998 in Stone Mountain, Georgia. According to a police report,
a DeKalb County auto crime investigator happened to be on a stakeout
when Akon had the misfortune to drive past him. It probably didn't help
that, as the police report notes, Detective R.L. Brewer "observed a
white BMW vehicle being driven by a B/M subject." During a prior court
case, Akon listed a home address in Stone Mountain that was slightly
more than a mile away from where Brewer spotted him.

In
a TSG interview, Brewer recalled that he was positioned outside a
shopping center and that his stakeout had nothing to do with Akon; the
singer was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. The performer
happened to be driving a car whose license plates triggered a "stolen
vehicle response" when the auto's tags were typed into a police
computer. Brewer followed Akon until two uniformed backup officers
arrived and pulled over the BMW 740 near Highway 78, according to a
police report. He was taken into custody "without incident." A
passenger, Willie Ashley, was detained on unrelated traffic charges.

[Years later, as he recounted his purported "ringleader" arrest in
an interview for a DVD, Akon said that he was "going up 78 headed
toward DeKalb" when he was surrounded by police cars. With their
weapons drawn, officers began simultaneously barking at him to get out
of his car. One cop, the singer recalled, remarked that, "You was
caught in a car once before and they said it was a hot pursuit or
something. But your name popped up in the computer." So, the singer
added, "He locked me up." The arrest left the imaginary kingpin
perplexed and wondering if he had been framed by someone who "planted
something," since he knew how "clean" his work was.]

[In a November 2006 Rolling Stone interview, Akon took a similar
fact-free flight of fancy, claiming that he was "driving a BMW 325, on
my way to the chop shop" when he was apprehended. "That's the slowest
car in the whole fleet...I'd been in high-speed pursuits before and
always got away, but this time I didn't because the car was too slow. I
didn't even want that car, it was a favor to someone else. And I wound
up getting locked up for three years."]

While
searching the BMW, Brewer discovered title and registration documents
purporting to show that Akon was the rightful owner of the $70,000
vehicle. But the detective believed the paperwork was fraudulent and
called in FBI Agent Peter McFarlane for a consultation. McFarlane, who
has worked auto crime cases in Atlanta since 1972, examined the
documents and concluded that the title papers were bogus.

Brewer obtained warrants charging Akon with possession of stolen
property, forgery, and possession of an auto with an altered vehicle
identification number. The singer was booked into the DeKalb County
Jail, where bond was set at $20,000 (an amount Akon could not raise).

Nearly
a decade after the arrest, McFarlane, who retired from the FBI in
late-2002 after 31 years, could still recall some details of the case,
due to one memorable fact regarding the BMW's theft in August 1998.

Three months before Akon was arrested driving the car, the vehicle
had been stolen from in front of the Columbus, Georgia office of Robert
Schiffman, a wealthy financier. Schiffman also was a collector of
valuable guitars, one of which happened to be in the trunk of the sedan
when it was taken. The car thieves, though, were unaware that the
instrument, a 1931 Herman Hauser that once belonged to the classical guitar virtuoso Andres Segovia,
was worth more than the BMW itself. The guitar, then valued at
$100,000, was one of only two instruments that Hauser built for Segovia
(the other guitar, made in 1937, is part of The Metropolitan Museum of
Art's collection).

Along with everything else in the car that could trace back to the
BMW's owner, the guitar was discarded by the thieves. The instrument,
still in its $1200 case, was eventually discovered in a roadside bush
by a BellSouth lineman. Five years later, the Hauser guitar finally found its way back to Schiffman, who is now seeking to sell the guitar for upwards of $250,000.

McFarlane, 62, who has worked auto crime cases for Georgia's
Department of Revenue since his FBI retirement, laughed out loud when
told of Akon's claims about running a "notorious" auto theft ring,
owning chop shops, and being brought down by turncoat underlings. "Ah,
this is bullshit. This guy is so phony. He's an arrogant SOB," said
McFarlane. Asked about Akon, Brewer said, "I don't think he had any
role besides [wanting] to drive a high-dollar vehicle. And I say this
because we didn't link him to any other cars."

Nobody was arrested for the actual theft of the BMW, and it is
unclear how Akon obtained the auto. Though both McFarlane and Brewer
recalled how a member of Jagged Edge, an Atlanta-based R&B group,
opted to purchase stolen cars at a deep discount.

Either
way, the felony case against Akon was dropped in its entirety in
late-April 1999. He spent five months in jail before prosecutors
decided not to make a grand jury presentment. The singer was
immediately sprung from the DeKalb jail, departing at 1:27 on a
Wednesday morning, according to county records. Somehow, in the
intervening years, those few months in custody morphed into three years
in prison, the majority of Akon's purported total of four-and-a-half
years behind bars.

In June 1999, Akon pleaded guilty in New Jersey
to a weapons possession count. In return, Burlington County prosecutors
agreed to drop a second felony charge stemming from the singer's
possession of an allegedly hot car. He was later fined $1000 and
sentenced to three months probation, the supervision of which was
immediately transferred to Georgia, where Akon resided. In opting for a
probationary--and not custodial--sentence, Judge Donald P. Gaydos noted
that Akon had "no history of prior delinquency or criminal activity or has led a law-abiding life for a substantial period of time before the commission of the present offense."

Gaydos also concluded that Akon would likely "respond affirmatively
to probationary treatment." This was an accurate prediction on the
judge's part, as Georgia officials requested, in late-2001, that the
performer's supervision be terminated early since he had been a model probationer. That request was granted by a New Jersey judge on September 20, 2001.

Of
course, this was during the exact period of time (1999-2002) that Akon
claims he was imprisoned in Georgia for his supposed "Gone in 60
Seconds" handiwork. It was during that fabricated prison stretch, of
course, that he supposedly wrote much of "Trouble," his first album. In
that CD's liner notes, the acknowledgements end with this purposely
vague salute: "Last but not least, thanks to the jailhouse in which I
was confined--which made me a better, stronger and wiser man."

The album's autobiographical centerpiece, "Locked Up," is Akon's
lament about being warehoused and forgotten in prison, where "They
won't let me out/They won't let me out." He never actually served those
three years, so these observations lose a bit of their
authoritativeness. Additionally, a check of United States Copyright Office records
reveals that when Akon's publishing company registered the song they
listed its "Date of Creation" as 2003. So "Locked Up" was not even
created during the three-year period in which Akon was not even in
prison.

And as if there needs to be further evidence to rebut the singer's
claims about being imprisoned from 1999-2002, Akon's own son Tyler
could serve as Exhibit A.

According
to a paternity action filed late last year in Fulton County, Georgia,
the boy was born on July 26, 2001, which roughly puts his date of
conception in late-October 2000 (again squarely in the middle of a
prison term that Akon never served). As part of the amicable paternity
action, the singer was ordered to pay the boy's mother, a former Alpha
Delta Pi sorority girl at Eastern Kentucky University, $2795 in monthly
child support.

Curiously, Superior Court filings in the paternity case--in which
both sides appear to have been represented by the same attorney--list
Akon's monthly gross income as a relatively paltry $15,900, or $190,800 annually (child support payments are based, in part, on this figure).

In reality, Akon likely makes 20 or 30 times that amount monthly via
record sales and touring income. His Atlanta-area real estate portfolio
alone is worth about $5 million. In January, he paid $1.65 million for
an 8697-square-foot McMansion on 4.96 acres adjacent to the Atlanta
National Golf Club. In February 2007, Akon and "Devyne" Stephens paid
$2.65 million for a 13.29 acre Fulton County estate. Photos of the two
sprawling properties can be seen below.

Though
it had been less than a year since the property was purchased (and
despite the housing market being in distress, especially in the Atlanta
area), Akon assured VH1 during a recent tour of the estate that his
home was "already appraised for $25 million." Fittingly, the R&B
star has dubbed his home "Dream Land."

He also told VH1 of his desire to house lions and tigers on the
grounds and how he "flew in an African crocodile" that will live in a
glass-enclosed chamber that can be peered into through a transparent
panel on the home's ground floor. Oh, and near the indoor waterfall he
is going to install a retractable stripper pole.

Which will come as no surprise to anyone who has listened to his
albums. While his lilting, nasal voice and hooks are distinctive and
contagious, Akon's lyrics are pedestrian and filled with standard-issue
hip-hop boasts and references to strippers, bitches, girls "dropping it
to the floor," and sex acts performed atop furniture. Women are said to
be "looking bootylicious and jingling," and a worked-up Akon notes that
he might even ask a gal if he could "bust all over your anatomy."

In "Smack That," Akon's Top Ten collaboration with Eminem, the R&B star sings of a possible romantic encounter:

Maybe go to my place and just kick it like Tae Bo
And possibly bend ya over/Look back and watch me smack that

All on the floor/Smack that
Give me some more/Smack that
Til you get sore/Smack that

Leonard Cohen he is not.

* * *

Akon is not the first performer to fudge some biographical details.
But few artists have gone so far out of their way to aggressively
promote these fabrications and embellishments (or you could just call
them lies).

In hip-hop circles, being considered "real" is a requirement for
success. Akon, on the other hand, couldn't be more fake. He's the music
industry's phantom menace, a guy who, four years ago, cast himself as a
crime kingpin and has happily played that fictitious role ever since.
Really, why tinker with success? In fact, if the title is any
indication, the singer's hotly anticipated third album, "Acquitted,"
promises more of the same when it is released later this year.
According to an MTV report, Akon has even already recorded his fourth
album, which he's calling "Double Jeopardy. What's next? "No True
Bill?" "Pretrial Detention?"

During a Vibe interview last year, Akon eagerly repeated his phony
stories of criminal entanglements, but balked when reporter Laura
Checkoway asked about his age, which he has long sought to cloak. By
all indications, he was born April 16, 1973, so birthday wishes are in
order (though his first Copyright Office registration carried a 1972
year of birth). The singer explained to Checkoway that, "The only thing
I hide is my age," adding, "Before I lie to you, I'd rather say
nothing."

It was a rare moment of self-restraint from the serial fabulist, who
offered one other bit of self-examination: "I always had a way of
getting over on people, whether manipulating or conning them."

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2008/0416081akon1.html