Episode 3: A Victim of Blackmail

Guaranteed Human. A win is a win. A win is a win.

I don't care what you're talking about.

Yep, that's me. Clifford Taylor the fourth. You might have seen the skits,

“my basketball and college football journey,”

or my career in sports media. Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with athletes,

creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to the Clifford Show on the eye-heart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

And for more behind the scenes, follow @ Clifford and @ TikTok podcast and network on TikTok. In 2023, Bachelor Star Clayton Eckard

was accused of fathering twins.

But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax. You doctor this particular test twice in selling stretch. I doctor the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern.

Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Olespi and I come around to you. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped.

Laura, Scar still police. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Listen to Love Trapped podcast on the eye-heart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist. They take matters into their own hands. I vowed I will be his last target. He is not going to get away with this.

He's going to get what he deserves.

We always say that trust your girlfriends.

Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the eye-heart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the look-back at a podcast.

Next in 2009, that was big moment for me. 84's big to me. I'm Sanjay, and I'm Alex E. Grish. Each episode we pick a year, unpack what went down,

and try to make sense of how we survived it. With our friends, federal comedians and favorite artists, like Mark Lamont Hill, on the 80s. If it was a wild year, it was a wild year.

“I don't think there's a more important year for black people.”

Listen to look back at it on the eye-heart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it was good job. You're listening to it and learn the hard way on the eye-heart radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. [MUSIC PLAYING] Latisha James is the attorney general of the state of New York, a big deal in New York politics. But back in 2003, Tish, as she's known,

was working as the chief of staff for Brooklyn Assemblyman. By the way, this interview was over the phone and the audio is not great. I got the call from the police. And they said, did I know who shot James Davis?

And I immediately have them at what? [MUSIC PLAYING] The day before the shooting at City Hall, Tish had met with a man at her house. He told her he was a candidate in the upcoming primary

for City Council. The gentleman came and sat on my Duke for a couple of hours. And we had a long conversation about whether or not I were going to run against the incumbent. And if I was not what I support his candidacy.

The incumbent was Jamesy Davis. And the man was Neil Ascue, and when the police asked her if she knew who might have shot James, her mind immediately went to Neil. Because he hadn't just come to her house

to ask for her support. He needed her help. He wanted to know what advice I could provide them

“to the key Alex to use the victim of the blood now.”

10, 10 shots five. The silver 40 caliber handgun was recovered from the City Hall. Somebody tell me that. Was it a coincidence? It was a good idea.

It was kind when I thought that he was unstable. And it was times when I got maybe you shouldn't carry a gun. He alleged he was victim of the blood now. This is not just killing somebody because he

want this seat. I'm Jamal Jordan, and this is Roshak. I've had some very tough days in my life and some tough days in City Hall, but I don't think I've ever had as tough a day as today.

since the shooting.

“Mayor Michael Bloomberg was addressing reporters”

in a briefing room on the press floor of City Hall. Somebody who was an elected official of the City of New York has been killed. And they've been killed right here in City Hall. And another person is also dead.

What we know so far is the following. James Davis came into City Hall along with a Mr. Ascu, who had filed papers to run against James Davis. They came in together. They went through the security booth.

But did not go through the magnetometer. Apparently, the City Council members and the mayor have not been going through a magnetometer. The same way that pilots and stewardesses don't go through magnetometers at airports.

“Mayor Bloomberg admits that many public officials,”

including him, are disregarding security at City Hall. It's not even two years since 9/11. New York City is still very much on edge. A few minutes later, in the balcony of City Hall, it would appear that Mr. Ascu shot James Davis,

our City Council member, and that Mr. Ascu was in turn shot by a New York City police officer. It is still preliminary. We don't know anybody's motives. It does not appear that there is anything

else to the story other than a dispute between these two men. The dispute between these two men Neil Ascu and James Davis is now both of them are lying dead in the same hospital, a few blocks away.

“A hero of the hour, Officer Richard Berth,”

has been taken to St. Vincent's hospital to be treated for trauma. I got a visit from the police commissioner, Ray Kelly, and from him I find out that the person shot, you know, was killed. Richie didn't know the name of the man he had shot,

but he knew that now it's the first time

using his weapon outside of a firing range. He had killed someone. Councilman Larry C. Brooke had met James's guests at City Hall that day. It's kind of agitated. I didn't get a good vibe from this cat.

Larry is sitting in Beacon Hospital. He had brought fellow council member Maria Bias there after the shooting, because she was hyperventilating. And she's being treated now. I'm sitting there waiting for her,

and the detectives come over to me, and say, if you can do an identification for us, it would be helpful. So I said, okay, what do you want me to do? He said, come with us, and he had to get by and up there.

When they pulled out the sheet, saw the guy's face. So I said, oh, that's the guy that was with James, and then they pulled it, and you could see the bullet here and right here. The hole was in his chest. I'm like, whoa, that was the guy.

I never go down to city hall ever.

Any year of Xiaomi isn't real estate, but I had to go to the Woolworth Building to receive a deposit for a house that I rented in Miami. The Woolworth Building was built in 1913. It was once the tallest building in the world.

It's right next to city hall park. So I was literally maybe a hundred feet away from Moniel, when the shooting took place. They didn't think Neil asked you, I didn't connect the dots all I heard was of the shooting that happened in City Hall,

and it wasn't until I started heading back that reporters were already flocking to our office, because that's where you registered his campaign office. Any and a partner had opened a coworking space, or you could rent offices by the hour.

Neil was a friend, and they let him use it. But when he first told them about his campaign for city council,

he was surprised. Politics. We never really talked about it

here he was running for a political career. Neil didn't also confide into any of that. He had a problem. He did say his political adversary was trying to blackmail him regarding his sexuality, and I was something that

upset him greatly, because he never came out to his parents.

He was an innocent kid from the island. It was closeted. It was lost in a way. Cliff Nass was Neil asked he was friend and roommate in the 1990s, when Neil had first moved to New York City, from a working class town in Long Island. His family was conservative,

and religious, and Cliff understood that this was a real problem for Neil. He was at your whole witness, and he said his parents would disown him, that they found out he was gay.

Cliff first met Neil at Long Island University in 1992.

To Cliff, he seems like someone who was in the process of

“rewriting their own story. I remember the first day meeting him,”

I asked him what his ethnicity was, and he said to me, "I'm American Indian Irish, and a little black, but by his skin tone, and his features, he looks African-American." He wasn't happy being a black male. He wore contacts, and he relaxed his hair. He claimed to have went to a high school,

which is more of a upper middle income type than Long Island,

and he always tried to blend in with the upper middle income Jewish type of crowd.

Cliff could sense that Neil was struggling to figure out who he was, and that he had some demons. I was dating a brown skin Latin guy, and Neil comes in, and sees me on the sofa in my apartment with this brown skin Latin guy. And he said, "What are you doing with this end guy in my apartment?" That's the work he used to describe a guy. So a lot of deep-seated

“issues that he had with people's color under skin. I think there's a lot of hatred inside,”

which caused him a lot of anxiety and problems in his life. Cliff was big into the gay night-life scene in New York, and he opened that world up for his new friend. During school, we had a lot of fun, coming to the city, going to Fire Island. I introduced him to a lot of things. They were going to clubs that are now considered legendary. Like the Roxy,

the Lime Light, the Sound Factory, and the Paradise Garage. I remember going to Roxy on Saturday night, and I invited Neil to come, and I don't even think I had a t-shirt on. Neil was so new to this. He went in a button down shirt and tie. And then by the end of the night, his shirt was off. And then the next weekend, he was at the Sound Factory, dressed in shorts. Just shorts.

Neil was transforming from a closet at Jehovah's Witness into a party kid. Being in your 20s and being attracted gay men, you can experience a lot. We like nice things in life, we like the fast life, we like having fun in New York City. And we met a lot of very, very well-connected people and had fun at the same time. After college, Cliff now has moved into an apartment in Midtown Manhattan,

and then Neil moves into an apartment nearby. Cliff got a job in pharmaceutical cells, pinching doctors on new medications, a good job for hands and charmers. Neil did that as well, just to follow my footsteps. Very interesting. Neil liked to do a lot of things I did a lot. I did find it kind of weird, and maybe he did have some desire to be like me. Whatever reservations he might have had, Cliff invited Neil to move into his place at Riverbank,

a luxury apartment building on West 43rd Street. When they first met, it was Cliff who knew was way around the scene. But at this point, Neil was the one getting invites to parties with fancy people. Cliff remembers going with Neil to a lavish apartment that overlooks central park.

“I remember going up in the elevator and they said, "Oh, just get out. You have the whole floor."”

They said, "Oh, sting lives upstairs and Mel Gibson lives downstairs, but they only have a quarter of the

two of them hung out with fashion designer Jean Paul Godea clubs him in Hatton, and met Calvin Klein on

Fire Island. At this either, Mark and Jacob's took one look at Neil and asked him to be one of his models. Neil was definitely a social climber, and he used his assets, his brain and his body, to move far in this world. People offering him money, offering him to do modeling gigs.

“Yeah, how does hands and many different places, trying to figure out life?”

I would get his flash bar just because it was a social thing and have a couple of beers and mingle with people and talk. The guys we came out on the stage and they would shower and dance and so forth. Victor Cognizio is a fine art photographer. In Splashmire was a gay bar in West 17th Street in Lorraine Hatton. And also the first gay bar I ever went to with my fake ID at age 18. Victor met Neil Ascue there in the summer of 1992.

I found him very attractive and I thought I'd like to photograph him. We went down to the studio and did the pictures that night. He was very young and he really loved showing his body. We didn't

“do total nudes. I think we might have done something that is underwear. I could tell he really”

liked being a friend of the camera. He was just playing experimenting and discovering himself.

He was happy. Neil was always out for a good time and I actually kind of enjoyed the excitement

of being friends with him because there was always something good, funny, or even dangerous going to happen. But it could also go too far. Like one night back when they were still in college on Long Island. We were coming home from the club. We were driving through the Midtown Tunnel at a like Neil. I told you we have class in the morning. I can't be out to for in the morning. I can't do with this. You're crazy. You're crazy. And I said I don't know if I'm going to be

speaking with you again. And he pushed his foot on the accelerator and kept it going faster. He said, "If you're not going to talk to me, I'm going to kill you and me before we get in this tunnel." And I literally jumped out of the car at the booth. Neil and I met while we were working on Long Island for a company called Premier Catering. In a year or so on the again, I was a manager and Neil was the other manager of that catering team. They got to be friends. Neil was fun and

spontaneous. If maybe a little intense. I had dinner with my girlfriend and he brought his friend Mario who seemed like a very nice guy and we had dinner together and I told him I was going to Jamaica tomorrow with a bunch of other friends and he excused himself. He comes back 10 minutes later and says I just booked a flight I'm coming with you. The certain aspects of his friend remained closed off until Neil was finally ready to be open about his life. Neil and I hung out one night

“and he said, "Well, what I think about his friend, Mario?" And you know, my response was, you know,”

Mario seems like a very nice guy so he said, "Do you think Mario is a good-looking guy?" I'll call me a little bit off guard to be honest with you and I was like, "Oh, I guess he's a pretty good-looking guy." And it goes, "Honey, Mario is my lover." I know this guy now for a couple of years

and I had never suspected he was gay. But his ability to keep that from me was kind of surprising.

I absolutely saw Neil living two separate lives. Sure a lot of it had to do with him being in a closet with his family being your whole bit of witnesses. I'm sure it was a bit complex. And so when Neil told Kenny that his political rival was blackmailing him, threatening to out him his gay, it wasn't totally out of the blue. Neil might be out to his closest friends, but it's so long trying to break into politics. Maybe he felt that he had to keep some things to himself.

Yep, that's me. Clifford Taylor the fourth. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way, this platform became bigger than I ever imagined. And now I'm bringing all of that excitement

with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. One week I'll take you behind the scenes of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment, and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music. The Clifford Show isn't just the podcast, it's a space for honest conversations, stories that

don't always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger. So, if you've ever supported

“me, or you're just chasing down a dream, this is right what you need to be. Listen to the Clifford Show”

on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast, and for more behind the scenes, follow @ Clifford, and a TikTok podcast network on TikTok. In 2023, former bachelor star Clayton Eckard found himself at the center of a paternity scandal. The family court hearings that followed revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story. This began a years-long court battle to prove the truth. You doctor this particular task twice

in selling scraps. I doctor the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case. I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for. Some likes the greatest disinfectant. They would uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Olespie and Michael Marancini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is LoveTrap. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Ladies and gentlemen,

breaking news at America for County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges. This isn't over until justice has served in Arizona. Listen to the LoveTrap podcast on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

There's two golden rules that any man should live by. Rule one never mess with a country girl.

He plays stupid games. You get stupid prizes. And rule two never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield. And in this new season of the girlfriends. Oh my god, this is the same man. A group of women discovered they've all dated the same prolific con artist. I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care. So they take matters into their own hands. I said, oh hell no.

I vowed I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

“podcast. Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tap little Kim's boobs at the VMAs?”

Oh, what when Kanye said that George Bush didn't like black people? I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do a little Kim? Well, you can find out on the look back at it podcast. I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick you here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how he survived it. Including a recent episode with

Mark Lamont Hill waxing all about cracking the eggs. To be clear, 84 is big to me, not just because a crack. I'm down to talk about crackle David. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, no, no, put just so y'all know. I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've discussed crack. So I'm starting to see that there's a throughline. We also have eggs on the table.

“Are you finishing that sentence, and yes, I don't think there's a more important year for black people.”

Really? Yeah. For me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history.

Listen to look back at it on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to my new podcast, learn in a hard way with me. Your hopes and your favorite therapists, your games. And in recognition of mental health awareness month, I'm bringing over a decade of my own experience in the mental health field and conversations with so many incredible guests. I'm talking trip hunting, Ryan Clark. Sometimes

when we're in the pursuit of the thing, we get so wrapped up in the chase that we don't realize that we are in possession of the thing. And we're still chasing it, and we don't know when we're done enough because people with scoreboard watch life becomes about wins and losses. Steve Burns, Dustin Ross, because you find it important to be a good person while you hear on earth, are you a good person because you're free? Because that's two different intentions,

bro. Absolutely. And that's two different levels of trust. I want you to just really be a good person. Join me. Here again, it's as we have real conversations about healing, growth, fatherhood, pressure, and purpose on my new podcast, learn in a hard way. Open your free, I heart radio app, search, learn in a hard way, and listen to that.

for the 35th district of New York City.

I was covering Brooklyn politics pretty closely in those days, and I always looked at the campaign

finance board filings. I would go through the list and see who's looking to run this year, journalist Eric Anglist. Most of the names on these lists, I would know because I've been covering Brooklyn on and off since 1991. I saw this name, Othanyl Escu, and I thought, "Wow, who is this guy?" People run for office generally have some standing in the community, but Escu had never heard of them. This wasn't totally unusual. There's always a few candidates

who come out of nowhere, and as a rule, they never win. But nonetheless, I sent an email just to ask, like, "Who are you? What's going on?" And Loan behold, he responded. And yes, he said he was running in this council race. Neil Stone in his emails struck Eric as a bit odd. He sent him a

“long bio, a kind of humble beginnings type thing. You have to be a little bit strange to run for”

office, especially if you have absolutely no standing in the community. You know, as ever heard of you, you know, so I figured he was a little bit different, and that was fine, and nothing wrong with that. But I called up James Davis, and I said, "Counselman, have you ever heard of

off Neil?" Asked you, and David said to me, "I've never heard of him

or her." And then he laughed. He was a trash doctor. James Davis often found a way to take small jobs at his opponents like this, undermined them in little ways. To him, it was all part of the game. He was also quoted as laughing and saying, "Ask you, come out, come out wherever you are, who, in central Brooklyn, those days was not a trash doctor, some extent." There were no kid gloves. Davis had run against the machine, so he viewed himself as someone who sort of made his own career

rather than making a deal to get into office. So rivals, he didn't take them lightly, but he didn't necessarily treat them that well either. Eric Morales forgot about this Neil ask you, until the next important moment in the process. When candidates have to hand in the signatures, they've collected in order to get on the ballot. The deadline was July 10th, 13 days before the shooting. To get on the ballot was not easy to do. Ask you at five weeks to collect nine hundred signatures.

And this is painstaking work. I mean, you're standing on the street corner, stopping New Yorkers as they go by and saying, can you think a minute sign this? Not easy to do. Once you collect them, you take them to your election lawyer and you put them together with a cover sheet and everything has to be done by the book, all the eyes dotted, the T's crossed, everything's got to be perfect.

“And then you have to bring those bound petitions to the Board of Elections Office.”

And you have to fire them by a deadline. Neil spent weeks collecting thousands more signatures than he needed because a lot of signatures get tossed out for technical reasons. And yet he didn't

get those bound petitions in by their deadline. There's no question that the petitions were never

properly delivered to the Board of Elections, but I do know that ask you, show it up at his attorney's office at 945 PM and the bound signatures were ready. All he had to do was bring them to the Board of Elections by midnight. And that didn't happen. And I also know that a few minutes after midnight, someone slid bound petitions under the door of the Board of Elections after the deadline. That doesn't count. They were never recorded.

Why wouldn't Neil ask you do all that work? Only to miss the deadline before it has changed the amount for city council. To this day, I believed he was thinking whether or not to file them and he had some kind of conflict. And at the end of the day,

“he decided, I'm going to file, but it was too late. And I believe that if”

ask you had gotten on the ballot, this murder never would have happened. And who knows? I mean, James Davis could literally be mayor at this point.

And he wrote back that because of quote, "human incompetency." The petitions did not get filed.

“It was a very cryptic message. He didn't explain who's incompetency. Who was that fault?”

What had happened? After the shooting, Eric inquisced Doug Deaver. His reporting said a little more light on the who, and the why. Before the July 10th deadline to file petitions for the Democratic Primary, ask you showed up at the home of a politically active person in the district and near tears revealed that he couldn't run because James Davis had some personal information on him that would destroy his life.

Oh, when is the win? Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the fourth. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way, this platform became bigger than I ever imagined. And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations

with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. One week I'll take you behind the scenes of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment, and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music. The Clifford Show isn't just a podcast, it's a space for honest conversations, stories that don't

always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger. So, if you've ever supported me,

“or you're just chasing down a dream, this is right what you need to be. Listen to the Clifford Show”

on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow @ Clifford, and a TikTok podcast network on TikTok. In 2023, former Bachelor Star Clayton Eckard found himself at the center of a paternity scandal. The family court hearings that followed revealed glaring inconsistencies in her story. This began a years-long court battle to prove the truth. You doctor this particular task twice

in selling stress. I doctor the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to crack the case. I wanted people to be able to see what their tax dollars were being used for. Some likes the greatest disinfectant. They would uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Greg Olespie and Michael Marancini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is LoveTrap. As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Ladies and gentlemen,

breaking news at America for County as Laura Owens has been indicted on fraud charges. This isn't over until justice has served in Arizona. Listen to the LoveTrap podcast on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. There's two golden rules that any man should live by.

Rule one, never mess with a country girl. He plays stupid games. He gets stupid prizes.

And rule two, never mess with her friends either. We always say that trust your girlfriends. I'm Anna Sinfield. And in this new season of the girlfriends. Oh my god, this is the same man. A group of women discovered they've all dated the same prolific con artist. I felt like I got hit by a truck. I thought how could this happen to me? The cops didn't seem to care. So they take matters into their own hands.

They said, oh hell no. I vowed. I will be his last target. He's going to get what he deserves. Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

“podcasts. Do you remember when Diana Ross, double-tap little Kim's boobs at the VMAs?”

Oh, what when Kyle Hay said that George Bush didn't like black people? I know what you're thinking. What the hell does George Bush got to do a little Kim? Well, you can find out on the look back at it podcast. I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how he survived it.

Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill waxing all about crack in the eighths. To be clear, 84 was big to me, not just 'cause of crack. I'm down to talk about crack all day, but yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Put just so y'all know, I mean, at this point, Mark, this is the second episode where we've discussed crack. So I'm starting to see that there's a through line. We also have eggs on the table.

Are you mentioning a sense of, yeah, I don't think there's a more important year for black people.

Really, yeah, for me, it's one of the most important years for black people in American history.

Listen to look back at it on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Wait a minute, Dakota. How bad did it get? Well, I got bad enough that her son-in-law had to eventually arrest her himself. Oh, she moved in for two weeks, lasted for five. She left nail clippings in the bathtub, candy stuck to the furniture, and then she pressed her earliest to bedroom door and burst in screaming. She did not burst in while they were shooting.

If they kicked her out and paid for hotel, and they thought, "Hey, it's finally over."

Days later, she called her son-in-law at work, claiming that his partner had been in some kind of freak accident, and had been rushed to the hospital in an ambulance. He called every hospital in the city, and his partner was making coffee the entire time. She faked a medical emergency just to test whether or not he loved her son. Yeah, and she sat in the hospital parking lot waiting for him to see if he would show up.

When that didn't work, she walked into the son-in-law's police station, and filed a kidnapping report against him. She filed a kidnapping report against him in his own police station.

“Spoiler's karma's going to show up in the best way possible.”

So if you want to hear how this story ends, search okay story time on the iHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to podcasts. David R. Miller has been in the Brooklyn Political World for decades. On the evening of July 22nd, the night before the shooting, he ran into Neil asks you at a political event at a bar on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. After the shooting, Miller began referring to Neil only as the killer.

The killer was paying James Davis to be a technician. What a technician is, so you have the submit additions, right? Your technician goes line-by-line to make sure it conforms to the arcane, very strict laws in New York State. Often a candidate has an organization behind them to handle this kind of thing, but if they don't, they hire outside help, a technician.

Neil told David Miller that he had paid James Davis to provide this kind of help. He also told them that he had ruined him. He was broke. He ran through his savings and everything in his life. I know he spent his last $10,000 on a campaign. I know that for a fact. His last money, he's paying James, and then he has knocked off the ballot.

Then it's petitioned for a file one time. That's one of the oldest tricks in the book, man. Okay? That is the oldest trick in a book for insurgents. Van de Dito's fames for that. Van de LBD was a controversial state assemblyman from Brooklyn. On August 30th, 1990, he was shot to death in his storefront campaign office. David Miller was supposed to have lunch with him that day. Van Dito will say, "Okay, man, give me a hundred. She got a big area.

A hundred sheets. That's 1500 signatures. You only need 500 valid things to make the ballot. So, you're in the bank. That he gives you a hundred signatures. You don't all make the ballot. You're all, and you pay all at money for it. Is it possible that James Davis took the last of Neil's savings to help him file his

“petitions and secure a place in the ballot only to sabotage his efforts and eliminate the competition?”

I don't trust anything that Ask you said because a lot of what he said was verifiably untrue, Eric Enquistigan. To him, the idea that James Davis would want to knock Neil off the ballot makes no sense. James already had someone else running against him. Besides Neil Ask you, it would be better for James if Neil was in the race. Davis was the incumbent. There's an anti-in incumbent vote in any election.

And if you can split that vote, it basically eliminates any chance that either in surgeon candidate

has to win. On the morning of the shooting, just a few hours after seeing David Miller at the bar on Atlantic Avenue, Neil made a phone call to the FBI. Today after the shooting, NPR reported on Neil's call. Investigators tell the associated press that the gunman, Oath Neil Ask you, called the FBI the morning of the killing, and in a rambling conversation told the bureau that his victim, the councilman James Davis,

was blackmailing him, threatening to expose him as gay unless he dropped a political challenge.

“That actually I think was true. Generalist Errol Lewis knew James Davis and lived in the 35th district.”

Listen, if it's 2003 and you're running and your opponent is gay, in crown heights, with as a bunch of conservative blackbaptists and a whole lot of conservative acedum, you would be negligent not to at least bring it up. You know, and whether you're

But the 35th district wasn't just crown heights. It was also a fort green, a neighborhood that because of its black gay community was nicknamed chocolate Chelsea.

For Eric Anquist, it doesn't add up. This theory never made sense for a number of reasons. Number one,

Ask you was already out of the closet. He frequented gay establishments. So it was not a mystery that he was gay. Number two, being gay was not a negative in 2003 in central Brooklyn to run for office. If anything, it might have even helped him pick up a few votes. Number three, James Davis had a very good relationship with the gay community. He saw them as important to his own career and the idea that he would out someone that would have outraged

the gay community. And there's no way he would have even threatened to do that. Neil may have deliberated and then filed his petitions to late as Eric Anquist speculates. And he told more than one person that James Davis was flag-mailing him.

“But did James really have some secret information on Neil?”

And if it wasn't about being gay, then what was it about?

That's next time. On Worshack, Murder at City Hall. Worshack, Murder at City Hall is a production of iHeart Podcasts in partnership with Best Case Studios. It's based on death in the chamber by Brent Katz. It's written in his executive produced by Brent Katz in Adam Pinkess, produced by Charlotte Morley, and co-produced by me, Jamal Jordan, edited and mixed by Max Michael Miller.

Original music was composed by Tune Day at a Pimpay and Walder's Obey. Our tribal producer is the bell, door ball, consulting producer, Amir Lumis. Development production assistance from David Michael, our tribal content provided by Spectrum News, New York 1. Additional material by NPR. Our iHeart team is Alipary, Carl Kadel and Anna Stump. Follow and rate Worshack wherever you get your podcasts.

When is when? Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the fourth. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey, or my career in sports media. Well now, I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfills of conversations with athletes,

creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to the Clifford Show on the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow @ Clifford and @ TikTok podcast in that work on TikTok. In 2023, Bachelor Star Clayton Eckard was accused of fathering twins. But the pregnancy appeared to be a hoax.

“You doctored this particular test twice in silence, correct?”

I doctored the test once. It took an army of internet detectives to uncover a disturbing pattern. Two more men who'd been through the same thing. Regal S. B. Ant, Michael Manchini. My mind was blown. I'm Stephanie Young. This is Love Trapped. Laura, Scott Snail Police.

As the season continues, Laura Owens finally faces consequences. Listen to Love Trapped Podcast on the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. When a group of women discover they've all dated the same prolific con artist. They take matters into their own hands. I vowed. I will be his last target.

He is not going to get away with this. He's going to get what he deserves.

We always say that trust your girlfriends.

Listen to the girlfriends. Trust me, babe. On the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. On the look back at it podcast. The next seminar is Big Mama for me, 84's Big To Me. I'm Sam Jack and I'm Alex E. Grish.

Each episode we pick you here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. With our friends, fellow comedians and favorite artists. Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s.

“If it was a wild year, I don't think there's a more important year for black people.”

Listen to look back at it on the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it was good job. You're listening to learn the hard way with your favorite therapist and host care games. This space is about black men's experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anyway,

How many men carry your suit or arm it?

It's similar to the world that you're not to be played with,

“and just because you have the capability that does not mean that you need to.”

Listen to learn the hard way on the iHeart Radio App, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

This isn't iHeart Podcast. Guarantee to you, man.