Julian Bynum walked out of a townhouse in North Hollywood, oblivious to the man crouched behind a car with a gun.
The Chicago native was having problems with a roommate. Each accused the other of theft. The roommate was missing a gold chain; Bynum was out a Rolex. To settle the issue, police suspect the roommate turned to a professional killer.
The same suspect is also charged with killing three people and wounding six more in the upscale Westside neighborhood of Benedict Canyon in 2023.
Both cases trace their origins to Chicago, according to records reviewed by The Times. And last week, in an unrelated indictment brought by federal prosecutors in Los Angeles, the Chicago rapper Lil Durk was charged in an alleged murder-for-hire plot that left a man dead near the Beverly Center.
The alleged hit men in all three cases are not the urbane assassins of James Bond or Jason Bourne films. According to court records, they flew on Spirit Airlines and slept five to a single hotel room.
Sometimes, police said, they got sloppy leaving DNA at crime scenes and forgetting to turn off their phones.
Los Angeles draws Windy City natives for all the expected reasons. They come for vacation or to find fame in the music industry. They come looking for glamour and settle for a cheap version of it in short-term rentals and leased luxury cars.
Petty beefs that began elsewhere follow them to Los Angeles.
Bynum, 30, had been living in Las Vegas with another Chicago native, Nasir Warfield, according to an affidavit written by Det. Luis Romero of the LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide Division.
Warfield is a rap artist called Nizzy, according to the affidavit and a press release announcing the release of his first mixtape, “The Art of Finesse.” Raised on the South Side of Chicago, Warfield told the Nevada parole board he moved to Las Vegas to take his four children away from “bad influences” in his hometown.
He tried to make a living in Las Vegas working construction, but “money started to get a little scarce,” he said. “I ended up making a poor decision.”
Warfield served time in a Nevada prison for forgery. Released in 2021, he moved back to Las Vegas and shared a house with Bynum.
Ralph Rocha made secret tapes documenting his tenure as an informant. Were they an insurance policy? A way to blow off steam? An early stab at a screenplay?
Warfield accused Bynum of stealing $90,000, a friend of Bynum told police. Bynum denied the theft but Warfield took his Rolex, the friend said. Bynum in turn stole Warfield’s gold chain.
According to the detective, Warfield allegedly put out a bounty of $20,000 to $30,000 on Bynum’s life.
Warfield didn’t respond to a request for comment relayed through his mother. In a brief phone call, she told The Times her son had nothing to do with any homicides in Los Angeles. “He doesn’t even know those people,” she said.
Police heard that Warfield contracted the hit to two Chicago natives nicknamed Draco and Chevy who were living in Los Angeles, Romero wrote in his affidavit.
Bynum was worried enough to move back to Chicago with his girlfriend and newborn.
The night of Dec. 16, 2022, Bynum was on vacation, visiting a friend in Hollywood. The two went to a townhouse on Simpson Avenue in North Hollywood, Romero wrote. The friend left around 11 p.m. Bynum stayed.
At 11:35 p.m., Bynum sent a text message to his girlfriend: “Fin pop outside wit Draco.”
Bynum’s friend had heard of Draco. He told the LAPD that Draco was a “contract killer from Chicago” who “makes a living out of robbing and killing people,” Romero wrote.
Bynum walked out of the townhouse a minute after texting his girlfriend.
Video surveillance footage obtained by detectives showed Bynum walking south on Simpson Avenue. A man slips out of the passenger-side door of a Mercedes-Benz GLC parked down the street. He crouches behind the car as Bynum walks by. Then he runs up and starts shooting.
The gunman picks something off the ground, possibly Bynum’s cellphone. The shooter stands over Bynum’s body and unloads into his head.
A month after Bynum was killed, police found three dead women inside a bullet-riddled white Porsche Macan parked at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac in Benedict Canyon.
On Jan. 28, 2023, Iyana Hutton, Nenah Davis and Destiny Sims had gone with some friends to a concert at the Roxy in West Hollywood and a bowling alley.
When they returned to their AirBnB on Ellison Drive around 2:30 a.m., two men wearing ski masks and black clothing started shooting, one of the surviving victims told LAPD detectives.
The woman said the gunmen didn’t say anything before they opened fire. She “only heard screaming,” Romero wrote.
Canvassing Benedict Canyon for surveillance footage, detectives found video that showed a blue Tesla leaving the area after the homicides.
They tracked the car to a high-rise in Beverly Hills. Cameras in the lobby captured three men wearing black hooded sweatshirts and black pants leaving four hours before the shooting.
Their names were Daries Stanford, Dejean Thompkins and Dontae Williams, according to Romero.
Detectives got a warrant for location data from a phone registered to Stanford, Romero wrote. The records showed the device had traveled from Chicago to Las Vegas three days before the homicides.
Around the time of the shooting, it pinged in Benedict Canyon. The next day the phone was in Las Vegas before returning to Chicago.
A young couple targeted four cannabis dispensaries for robberies during a six-week-long spree, prosecutors say. Detectives titled the case file “Romeo and Juliet.”
Romero obtained flight manifests that showed Thompkins and Williams sat next to each other on a Spirit Airlines flight from Chicago to Las Vegas three days before the shooting. The day after the homicides, the detective wrote, the two flew back to Chicago from Vegas.
When detectives combed through Thompkins’ phone records, they found a clue linking him to Bynum’s homicide, according to Romero. His phone left the Beverly Hills high-rise around 10:41 p.m. the night Bynum was killed and pinged in North Hollywood between 11:21 p.m. and 11:37 p.m.
Bynum was shot to death at 11:36 p.m.
In April 2023, three months after the Benedict Canyon shooting, Thompkins was arrested in Will County, Ill.
When LAPD detectives searched the Las Vegas home of Warfield, the man who allegedly put a bounty on Bynum’s head, they seized $56,000 in cash, and guns, according to a forfeiture complaint filed in Nevada. They also found phones containing “numerous communications” between Warfield and Thompkins, Romero wrote.
Warfield has not been charged in connection with the North Hollywood or Benedict Canyon homicides.
Williams, whose DNA was found on a casing at the Benedict Canyon scene, was arrested in Gary, Ind. Police tracked Stanford to a sleek Manhattan apartment overlooking the Hudson River and took him into custody in May 2023.
The motive for the Benedict Canyon shooting remains unclear, but Romero wrote in his affidavit that Chicago police indicated the victims and suspects were from rival gangs. Several of the victims were affiliated with the Hotblock faction of the Black P Stones, the detective wrote, while Thompkins and Williams belonged to the EWOL faction of the Black Disciples.
Thompkins, Williams and Stanford have pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, attempted murder and assault with a firearm. No trial date has been set.
Thompkins’ attorney declined to comment and Williams’ lawyer didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Stacie Halpern, who represents Stanford, said the evidence doesn’t prove her client committed the Benedict Canyon homicides or show “he was even involved in any way.”
On Aug. 19, 2022, a black Cadillac Escalade pulled into a gas station on Beverly Boulevard, steps away from tourists spending a Friday afternoon shopping and eating at the Beverly Center.
A white Infiniti sedan pulled into a nearby alley. Men in ski masks sat in the back seat. Their target was Tyquian Bowman, a Georgia rapper called Quando Rondo.
Bowman waited in the Escalade as his cousin, Saviay’a Robinson, pumped gas. Three men stepped out of the Infiniti and opened fire. Bowman survived. His cousin didn’t.
LAPD detectives and FBI agents traced the shooting to Durk Banks, a Chicago rapper known as Lil Durk. Banks had blamed Bowman for the death of his friend, Dayvon Bennett, an FBI agent wrote in an affidavit.
A Chicago artist who performed as King Von, Bennett was signed to Banks’ music label, Only The Family. After an associate of Bowman killed Bennett at an Atlanta nightclub in 2020, the FBI alleged Banks put a bounty on the Georgia rapper’s head.
In August 2022, Banks’ associates learned that Bowman was in Los Angeles, FBI agent Sarah Corcoran wrote.
Lil Durk and members of his music group Only the Family were arrested by federal authorities in an alleged plot to kill rival rapper Quando Rondo.
A plan came together quickly. One-way tickets from Chicago to San Diego were purchased for the five-man hit team, Corcoran wrote. Banks allegedly wrote in a text message, “Don’t book no flights under no names involved wit me.”
Banks flew on a private plane from Miami to Los Angeles with an associate, Kavon Grant. According to an indictment, Grant supplied the shooters with ski masks, guns and cars — a rented BMW and the Infiniti, outfitted with fake license plates.
After killing Robinson, the shooters met with Grant to discuss getting paid, according to an indictment. The meeting place was a predictable choice for out-of-town visitors: In-N-Out Burger.
After FBI agents arrested the alleged shooters on Oct. 24, 2024, Banks booked one-way flights to Qatar and Switzerland, Corcoran wrote. He was also listed on the manifest for a private flight to Italy.
The FBI arrested Banks that evening near an airport in Miami. He has pleaded not guilty to murder-for-hire charges.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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