August 17, 2023 • 28 mins
A second man dies in the apartment. His untimely death sparks more outcry within the city, but unbelievably, no charges are filed.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
In this podcast, we're going to talk frankly but sensitively
about issues some people might find disturbing, including rape and suicide.
If you or someone you know is suicidal in the
US Down nine eighty eight, check out this podcast notes
page for information on LGBT plus mental health resources in
your community.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
In a previous episode of Shattering the System, we learned
how Jammel Moore, a young black man, was found dead
in the apartment of Ed Buck, a white man who
knew how to navigate the ins and outs of West Hollywood.
At first, Jammel's death was ruled an accidental overdose, and
just five days later the case was closed. Then eighteen
months later, another gay black man was found dead in
(00:43):
the same apartment, Timothy Dean, also died of an overdose.
Timothy was fifty five years old, and his friends say
he had a lot of interests and was still very
much full of life. He loved the game of basketball,
for instance. He was a genuine athlete and basketball was
something he loved and was good at. Something I find
(01:14):
interesting about the world of West Hollywood is when you
have a city full of gay folks, you start noticing
them everywhere because in a place like this. Well, they're
just all kinds of people. I remember a friend of
mine came to visit and we went to a basketball court,
you know, for a casual game of twenty one. Now,
when we got to the court, which is kind of
(01:35):
in the center of the most important part of West Hollywood,
this court is just across the street from the LA
Sheriff station than we have, and it's also a few
yards from almost all of we Hoo's nightlife. I'll give
you a more detailed tour of West Hollywood in a
later episode, But when we got back to my apartment,
he was so winded and tired, and he was even
surprised that a basketball court in West Hollywood would be
(01:59):
every single bit as competitive as one in South Central
or the South Bronx or the South side of Chicago
and Olid and Jonaman a lot of by Angela Blake Kerty.
Basketball was really important to Timothy Day. He was a
part of the National Gay Basketball Association the NNGBA, as
well as the Land of the Basketball League.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
The Dude was inducted.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Into the Gay Basketball Hall of Fame in two thousand
and one, and he won a silver medal at the
Paris Gay Games in twenty eighteen.
Speaker 4 (02:30):
Gay basketball has been around since the early nineties and
a lot of these stories are just lost if they're
not captured.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
That's Michael Thomas. He's a documentary filmmaker from Belgium. Sports
and basketball in particular are a part of his life
and work.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
So I live in Los Angeles myself since two thousand
and eight, and also when I moved here, I also
kind of came out as gay, and yeah, I've been
involved in the LGBT community ever since, and I also
play basketball in the Gay Basketball League.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
He's come close enough to Lebron James to get splashed
with champagne after one of Lebron's championship wins.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
It's over, It's over. Pleave women if a city of.
Speaker 5 (03:14):
Champions once again.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Among his documentaries is the film Game Face, about queer
athletes and their quest for acceptance. It was through basketball
that he learned about the life and death of Timothy Dean.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
Tim passed like first Jamel passed in twenty seventeen. Then
people kept going over there, drugs kept happening in that apartment.
Nothing was ever done. In twenty nineteen, Timothy Dean dies.
Still nothing is being done. People keep going in and out.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Michael had long wanted to do a documentary about basketball,
He just never thought it would come about the way
it did.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
He was already gathering interviews.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Among his friends about the world of gay sports and
basketball when Timothy Dean was found dead in the home
of that Buck. Two different men entered bucks apartment and
left in body bags. Michael could feel how much pain
their mutual friends were at.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
There was a basketball tournament in Los Angeles with teams
from all over the country.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
That came after the tournament, remember this is in twenty nineteen,
there was an after party at a bar on Santa
Monica Boulevard. Ironically, that bar was called Rage. Unlike other
bars along Santa Monica Boulevard, this bar was decidedly non
white and young. Rage, which has been closed and renamed,
(04:43):
is literally keaty corner to the LA Shriff's office.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
Lots of friends of tim were there at that party,
and the after party was at Rage, so not just
people from basketball, but everyone was able to come in there.
We were just surprised to suddenly see that ed Buck
was in front of the entrance and was just coming in.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
Michael could not believe it. There at a bar was
ed Buck.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Two men died of overdoses in Buck's apartment in an
eighteen month period, but he hadn't been charged in the
deaths Ja Melmore was dead, Timothy Dean was dead, and
walking into a bar full of Timothy Dean's friends is
ed Buck.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
He had no shame to just stroll the streets of
West Hollywood and look for his next victims in his eyes,
like he didn't do anything wrong, But it was just
incredible to see him there on the street. It's just
so furiating, and there's nothing we could do.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
To everyone's surprise, ed Buck's coming in to chill at
the bar.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Did I say the bar's name was Rage.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
We had to hold people back as well because we
didn't want them to get into it with ed Buck,
because you know, we don't want.
Speaker 6 (06:00):
Our friends to end up in jail.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
And at Buck being being out, you know.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
Michael realized there was something he could do. He could do.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
A documentary film, Jammel and tim was released in twenty
twenty one. It looks into the lives of ed Buck's victims.
Speaker 7 (06:17):
Ed Buck is a predator that masqueraded around just to
hunt down the bodies of black men, someone that was
hiding in plain sight.
Speaker 4 (06:31):
I know that one of the biggest frustrations from friends
and family is the difference of how the victims were
portrayed and how ed Buck was portrayed. At Buck, his
whole resume was being acknowledged in the press, everything that
he has achieved, But with Jammel and tim all the
worst things that they have done in life that was highlighted.
(06:54):
And then it's very easy too, you know, for people
to say like, oh, well, you know, prostitute this or
like they deserved it, or drugs or you know, then
it's very easy to blame or to like protect at bar.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
Yeah, so it's like political donor sex worker. Yeah right, well,
you know, not that that's a very.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
Correct it's it's yeah, the portrayal was day and night
because that human aspect was left out and a lot
of the portrayal. And I think if we create a
human aspect that creates compassion and a reason why we
should care about these.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Stories, that human aspect that gets left out is what
this podcast is here to do. Highlight what's been left out,
the personal and professional of a man called Timothy Dean
through the eyes of those who knew him and loved him.
Like his friend Richard Martin.
Speaker 5 (07:51):
He was not a drug addict, he was not homeless.
He never hurt a single person, and I think that
that's sometimes is forgotten. I'll say this specially with white men.
As soon as something scandal happens, white men have a
tendency going. I don't know him, I don't know him.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
I don't know him. Who was Timothy Dean?
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Fashionista, baller, benefactor, red carpet afficionado. And why does the
media only want to see him as a victim, a
drug addict or a sex worker. In the rush to
make news, often we don't pause to see the complex
people behind the headlines.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
Well, that's why we're here.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
I'm your host Sinari Glinton, and this is Shattering the System,
the true crime podcast that's about more than crime. Just
because someone's life ends in tragedy doesn't mean their life
is tragic. Today on the program, the life and Legacy
of Timothy Dean, Shattering the System gets started after this message,
(08:58):
this is Shattering the System, your host, Sinari and Glinton.
Speaker 6 (09:02):
Tim Dean was just larger than life. He had this
personality that you knew when he entered a room. You
knew that you knew how he loved you by the
way that he treated you.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
That clip we just heard is from the documentary Beyond
Ed Buck and in this episode we want to talk
about the life and legacy of Timothy Dean. Recently, my
producer Jonathan and I took a drive over the Hollywood
Hills into the San Fernando Valley to meet with a
good friend of Timothy Dean, Richard Martin.
Speaker 8 (09:42):
Richard.
Speaker 5 (09:43):
Yes, hey, how are you?
Speaker 8 (09:46):
I'm good? How about yourself?
Speaker 5 (09:47):
So?
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Okay?
Speaker 5 (09:50):
Sorry?
Speaker 2 (09:53):
We met Richard Barden at his home in Ta Luca Lake.
He's a Hollywood talent manager, mainly of soap opera actors.
You can see heads of actors all around his office,
all faces that looks sort of familiar.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
Stelle Harris from Seinfeld and Missus potato Head.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
She was my first client.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
And there is a tour that is I mean that
must be where something. There's a Missus potato Head from
toy Starter.
Speaker 5 (10:16):
She signed the top of it and signed.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Richard is one of Timothy Dean's closest friends. And as
he shows me around, you can see there are a lot
of photos.
Speaker 5 (10:25):
It's right in the right in here so yes, I
got to fund all these. You know, my husband takes
things away sometimes because I could be a little emotional
at times with things.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
But he's tim and is this you Yeah, that was me.
Speaker 5 (10:42):
That's probably the time when I met Tim.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
In this picture, he looks like he's about in his thirties.
Richard and Timothy met in the nineties at the Golden
Gym in Hollywood. Timothy Dean was tall, had broad shoulders
and an even broader smile. He was handsome, and when
he wasn't on the basketball court, you just might see
him sporting a well tailored suit with a variety of
bow ties. And after they first met at the gym,
(11:08):
Timothy and Richard remained friends and they sort of grew
up together trying to figure out the workings of West
Hollywood in the early aughts.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
And it's clear from.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Our conversation that Timothy ding he really celebrated life.
Speaker 5 (11:21):
One of the things that I always knew every year
is that his birthday wasn't his birthday, It wasn't a
birth week, it was a birth month. He loved to
celebrate his birthday. My husband and I threw his surprise
fiftieth birthday party.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
And we pulled it off.
Speaker 5 (11:37):
How I don't know what we did. If you never
met Jim, he was, you knew he was in the room.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
The thing is he could fill a room physically. He
was athletic.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
You know.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
They met at a gym.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
Timothy enjoyed all parts of Hollywood, though there was an
air of mystery about him. For instance, Richard threw Timothy's
fortieth and fiftieth birthday parties. After going through the math,
Richard realized that the two parties were actually only seven
years apart.
Speaker 5 (12:11):
But it wasn't really his fortieth. He it was his
forty third. But when I found out, when I added
things up to his fifty, I'm like, wait a minute,
this can't be fifty since forty three was only seven
years ago, and they lived with other girl. I like
a party.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Timothy Dean loved the party, and he loved being a
part of Hollywood life. He had a daily access to glamour.
He worked as a fashion consultant at Satsmith Avenue. Before that,
it was Bloomingdale's and Beverly Hills. Those kinds of jobs
put Timothy Dean at the very heart of what we
might call the Hollywood industrial complex. Designers, stylist, celebrities would
(12:50):
have all been among the people that he interacted with.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
We'd like to talk about reality television. We would talk
about every Real Housewives. He had an opinion about everyone
from Orange County to you know, the Real Housewives of
New York.
Speaker 9 (13:06):
We were all shiny hood ornaments. We were all train wrecks.
I know, we were all I've run with a fabulous
circle of people, the New York Magazine and the Real
Social I thought they were like, what the fuck? I
was broken a studio park. We were all flawed.
Speaker 5 (13:21):
Tim always felt like he knew them, and he would
be like, oh, did you He would miss VICKI did,
and all the old girl she'd he would always want
to talk to me about. And I fed into it.
I love I did love it.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
What sense did you have with his family? Well, I
had a different sense.
Speaker 5 (13:45):
Prior to I had met his sister and they weren't
really fully understanding of of him being gay. And I
felt that explained that they just didn't couldn't understand why this.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
Beautiful, you know.
Speaker 5 (14:08):
Man was gay and I don't. I honestly, to this day,
I don't really think they fully understand that. I just
don't think that they fully accepted him being gay.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
How did you see him deal with that?
Speaker 5 (14:21):
He came out to LA to become a totally different person,
and did he succeed in parts of it?
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Yes and parts Now.
Speaker 5 (14:31):
I think he had demons in him that came back
from honestly, and I don't really care because I've expressed
this to his family. I just don't think that he
ever felt fully embraced by his family.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Tailor is oldest time. Timothy Dean would do what gay
men do. He made his own family. He would help
his friends start his management company, doing everything from working
the phones to helping him find clients. And like so
many imposing tall black men, Timothy Dean cared about his
appearances and especially his clothes.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
I mean, he talked to those who knew him.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
He seemed to be on a constant self improvement streak.
Toward the end of his life, He'd be baptized at
the Megachurch one LA, and he would decide to get
his college degree while in his forties, all signs of
a man who was looking very much towards the future.
Speaker 5 (15:29):
I think one of the proudest moments of Timothy Dean's
life is when he graduated from Senemon College two years
He wore that cap and gown all night long, and
he was so proud of himself that he finally accomplished that.
Because he got no help from anybody. He did that
on his own. He had no family to help him.
He just decided that that's what he wanted to do.
(15:52):
He wanted to actually better himself.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
He would get his college degree surrounded by his friends.
He'd write about his accomplishment on Facebook that quote, this
degree will not change the world, but it will be
the first degree earned by anyone in my family. I'm
Scenario Glinton. This is shattering the system. The True crime
(16:16):
podcast that's about more men crowd, This is shattering the system.
I'm Sinnari Glinton.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
That's Timothy Dane.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
You here happily clapping and talking a bit in a
video clip shared by his friend Richard Martin, a video
that was not shared with us by anyone. Is a
part of Tim's life that the media widely reported on.
It was his work as an adult film actor known
by the name Whole Hunter, and many of the stories
about Timothy Dane, there is a prudish way that his
(16:55):
life is written about focusing on his work in porn
and his sex work to the exclusion of everything else.
And I think that this is a part of the
story of Timothy Dean, the pearl clutching that's happened in
relation to his sex work. I can't pretend to clutch
my non existent pearls. As a gay man who's lived
in multiple cities, I've known queer sex workers in Hollywood
(17:18):
or West Hollywood. It's kind of hard not to know them.
I have several friends who have done or do sex work,
and ed Buck isn't alone having paid for sex. I have,
and so have many other gay men. Now, I didn't
want to talk about Timothy Dean's sex work in a vacuum.
Speaker 8 (17:33):
Hi. So my name is Alex Garner. I'm the director
of Community Engagement and Impact. Global Impact is a global
nonprofit working not to advance gay men's health and human rights.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
The reason we wanted to talk to someone like Alex
Garner about sex work is that it's a reality of
the story and how ed Buck was able to lure
men to his home. It's one of the systems ed
Buck used to target a marginalized group. As I talked
to Alex Garner over a Zoom call. We touched on
everything from the economics of sex work to the changing
(18:05):
nature of gay dating. He could relate to the choices
that Timothy being made.
Speaker 8 (18:09):
I mean, I think so much of it has to
do with your relationship to sex, and your relationship to
your body, and your relationship to the idea that someone's
going to pay you money to have sex with them.
And I would have friends that would ask me, oh,
do you think I should do it? And I would say,
if you feel psychologically that you can handle any of
(18:34):
the issues that can come with it, and I mean
issues largely around feeling internally shame and guilt around something
that you're doing that's going to destroy you. Right, if
you're doing a job, any job, and doing that job
makes you feel makes you hate yourself, then that's not
the job for you. And we have everything in our
(18:57):
society and culture that reinforces this idea that if you're
doing sex work, all these list of bad things about you,
immoral and wrong and dirty and perverted. So if you're
able to overcome those things and see it as simply
another job, a job that you can enjoy, a job
that you can be good at, then you can you
(19:19):
can be successful. But if if unfortunately you're you aren't
able to do that, you don't have the skills or
the support to overcome or navigate that, then it can
do harm.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
We don't know whether not Timothy Dane found fulfillment and
doing sex scenes. We do know that money was tight.
That's true of a lot of Angelino's. The average home
in Los Angeles goes for a nine hundred and fifty
thousand dollars or an eight hundred square foot apartment goes
for an average twenty seven hundred dollars a month. And
(19:53):
we all play those games. How much money would it
take for you to cross some boundary? The key to
what Timothy Dean and Jamel Moore could be manipulated, Gardner says,
is they weren't economically vulnerable.
Speaker 8 (20:06):
If this person wasn't feeling economically vulnerable, they'd be less
likely to say yes to that if they didn't really
want to do it. Right, So we say yes to
things all the time if we think it's going to
make us more money. And we do that because we
often are feeling economically vulnerable, right, whether it's in terms
(20:26):
of housing or food or whatnot. So I think that's
the other larger structural issue, is that if people didn't
have to worry about those sorts of things, they would
make very different choices. They would have very different boundaries
when it comes to things like sex work, because those
boundaries can move depending on how hungry you are.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
And that's perfectly reasonable.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
When you're worried about eviction or getting food and you
see forty two thousand homeless people that's according to the
Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, which are disproportionately black. Man,
it's no surprise. Two men struggling to make ends meet,
but do what they had to do.
Speaker 10 (21:05):
But at some point, you know, an interesting story is
that he was contemplating having a child with the lesbian lady.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
That's Otavio today.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
He was Timothy Dean's last roommate, and the time that
he knew Timothy, he saw him contemplating major life changes.
Timothy had gotten a college degree in his forties, and
Octavio says, when Timothy was in his fifties, he was
thinking about having a child.
Speaker 10 (21:31):
And that was an interesting thing because I once came
home at the time that maybe was not expected, and
I sort of opened the door in the middle of
a private moment.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
Of your gay roommate with a woman.
Speaker 10 (21:50):
Yes, yes, yes, And you know clearly might have needed
a little bit of additional stimulation because on TV there
was a gay porn going on. I'm telling the story
because what's interesting to me is that the man was
really trying to find purpose in his life.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
The two men could not have been more different. There
was a twenty year age gap and a difference in
their sexualities, but Octavio says Timothy was someone that he
genuinely came to care for. Octavio says Timothy's generosity helped
him stay in La. Probably the most important gift that
Timothy gave him was that he allowed him to live
in his apartment off the books.
Speaker 10 (22:33):
He lived in this apartment with the rent control, and
I was never on the lease. I should have been
on the lease, you know, because by doing that they
would have had a claim to raise the rent. So
in order to allow me to live with you know
this very convenient rent, et cetera, you know, we we
sort of kept it among us.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Timothy Dan could have charged market rent for Octavio, but
instead charged him a ridiculously low amount O Tavio had
never seen Timothy on hard drugs, so he had no
idea what was in store for him when he got
to the apartment that late January night. He had just
gotten back from visiting his family in Bologna.
Speaker 10 (23:11):
So you know, I had the flight like early, like
seven am from Bologna. My mom and my father drove
me to the airport.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
From Bologna to lax fine economy can take twenty four
hours easy.
Speaker 10 (23:24):
And then you get to la and they broke my
luggage in you know, probably loading it in the plane.
One wheel is missing and literally is not even closing well.
So you know, I leave the airport, I take an uber.
I put all my stuff in, and you know, I
approached Hampton Avenue and I see you know, lights and
(23:45):
trucks and the I'm like, oh, weird, you know, maybe
they're filming something. And the uber driver that was a
Los Angeles native, he's like, no, you know, these are
trucks from the news. Something must have happened.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
And I'm like okay.
Speaker 10 (23:58):
So, you know, I leave the Uber and I'm approaching
the building and literally.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
There is like a crowd of people.
Speaker 10 (24:07):
Seeing me approaching this building, you know, coming closer to me.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
There are those moments when your life it's changed and
you're just waiting to hear about it.
Speaker 10 (24:16):
And I have like these broken legs luggage that I'm drugging,
and I have a bunch of clothes in my arms
and backpack.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
The next thing he knows, he's blinded by lights and
staring down the barrel of microphones.
Speaker 10 (24:28):
You know, they start pointing lights and microphones like I'm like,
what's going on. It's like they asked me, do you
live here? And I'm like yeah, And then somebody takes
out a phone with a picture and it's a picture
of Timothy's like do you know this person?
Speaker 3 (24:42):
Like yeah, it's my roommate. And everybody's like.
Speaker 10 (24:45):
You know, coming closer more, and I'm like, what's going on?
Speaker 2 (24:50):
You know, Otavio has no idea what has happened.
Speaker 10 (24:54):
They really got closer to me just to try to
gather more information, and the first thing they told me
is like we are trying to identify a victim, you know,
like we we think that the person that you know
passed away is this timusit In and we're gonna, you know,
we're gonna show you the picture to pretty much confirm
his identity. I was not believing in my ears, you know,
(25:18):
like I mean, you know, I certainly was like, oh,
you know, you know, I want to know more what's
going on here?
Speaker 3 (25:23):
You know how you know what happened.
Speaker 10 (25:25):
They didn't really have much information at that time. They
just said, you know, he was found dead in an
apartment not far away from here. And the version that
they told me it was like that, you know, I
think there were cameras in the building. You know that
he was let's say reported to enter the apartment or
the building, you know, let's say at midnight, and at
(25:45):
twelve thirty it was declared that by paramedics. So what
happened is that once I went through the crowd of journalists,
et cetera, you know, I entered the building and I
go up to the apartment and literally I'm in the
apartment for two men and said I hear knocking at
the door, and the gentleman that was the manager of
the building is like, you know, like there is a
(26:06):
murder investigation. You are not on the lease, you know,
you can't really stay here. So now it's like one
a m And I have my stupid broken luggage, et cetera.
And I have no time, you know, so I grabbed
like a couple of socks and underwear and I leave.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
After me in the state away two men dead in
(27:22):
one apartment, and yet ed Buck was still allowed to
keep luring men there. On the surface, it's a tourist mecca,
but West Hollywood has a very deep history of organized crime,
corruption and vice. That's on the next episode. Shattering the
(27:46):
System is a production of Macro Studios and iHeart Podcasts.
I'm your host Snari Glynn. You can follow me on
Instagram at scenari plus the Number one. Our executive producers
are Charles D. King, Asha Corpus, Win, Royorecchio, Jonathan Hunger,
Lindsay Hoffman, and Snari Linton.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
That's Me. Our podcast is.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Co written and produced by Ralph Cooper Third and ben
Corey Jones. Erica Rodriguez is our associate producer. Dana Conway
is our archival producer. Chris Mann is the audio engineer,
and sound design and music provided by Chris Mann with
Podshaper and Amy Via Lobos with help from Lisa Pollock.
Our assistant editors are Amie Via Lobos and r Protress.
(28:30):
Special thanks to Jennifer bon Montoni and the Press s
LA Agency. Also special thanks to Porsche, Robertson, Maigas and
Karen Grigsby dates.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
Stay tuned for what's the next shattering the system. See
you next time.
In this podcast, we're going to talk frankly but sensitively
about issues some people might find disturbing, including rape and suicide.
If you or someone you know is suicidal in the
US Down nine eighty eight, check out this podcast notes
page for information on LGBT plus mental health resources in
your community.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
In a previous episode of Shattering the System, we learned
how Jammel Moore, a young black man, was found dead
in the apartment of Ed Buck, a white man who
knew how to navigate the ins and outs of West Hollywood.
At first, Jammel's death was ruled an accidental overdose, and
just five days later the case was closed. Then eighteen
months later, another gay black man was found dead in
(00:43):
the same apartment, Timothy Dean, also died of an overdose.
Timothy was fifty five years old, and his friends say
he had a lot of interests and was still very
much full of life. He loved the game of basketball,
for instance. He was a genuine athlete and basketball was
something he loved and was good at. Something I find
(01:14):
interesting about the world of West Hollywood is when you
have a city full of gay folks, you start noticing
them everywhere because in a place like this. Well, they're
just all kinds of people. I remember a friend of
mine came to visit and we went to a basketball court,
you know, for a casual game of twenty one. Now,
when we got to the court, which is kind of
(01:35):
in the center of the most important part of West Hollywood,
this court is just across the street from the LA
Sheriff station than we have, and it's also a few
yards from almost all of we Hoo's nightlife. I'll give
you a more detailed tour of West Hollywood in a
later episode, But when we got back to my apartment,
he was so winded and tired, and he was even
surprised that a basketball court in West Hollywood would be
(01:59):
every single bit as competitive as one in South Central
or the South Bronx or the South side of Chicago
and Olid and Jonaman a lot of by Angela Blake Kerty.
Basketball was really important to Timothy Day. He was a
part of the National Gay Basketball Association the NNGBA, as
well as the Land of the Basketball League.
Speaker 3 (02:21):
The Dude was inducted.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Into the Gay Basketball Hall of Fame in two thousand
and one, and he won a silver medal at the
Paris Gay Games in twenty eighteen.
Speaker 4 (02:30):
Gay basketball has been around since the early nineties and
a lot of these stories are just lost if they're
not captured.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
That's Michael Thomas. He's a documentary filmmaker from Belgium. Sports
and basketball in particular are a part of his life
and work.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
So I live in Los Angeles myself since two thousand
and eight, and also when I moved here, I also
kind of came out as gay, and yeah, I've been
involved in the LGBT community ever since, and I also
play basketball in the Gay Basketball League.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
He's come close enough to Lebron James to get splashed
with champagne after one of Lebron's championship wins.
Speaker 3 (03:10):
It's over, It's over. Pleave women if a city of.
Speaker 5 (03:14):
Champions once again.
Speaker 2 (03:15):
Among his documentaries is the film Game Face, about queer
athletes and their quest for acceptance. It was through basketball
that he learned about the life and death of Timothy Dean.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
Tim passed like first Jamel passed in twenty seventeen. Then
people kept going over there, drugs kept happening in that apartment.
Nothing was ever done. In twenty nineteen, Timothy Dean dies.
Still nothing is being done. People keep going in and out.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
Michael had long wanted to do a documentary about basketball,
He just never thought it would come about the way
it did.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
He was already gathering interviews.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
Among his friends about the world of gay sports and
basketball when Timothy Dean was found dead in the home
of that Buck. Two different men entered bucks apartment and
left in body bags. Michael could feel how much pain
their mutual friends were at.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
There was a basketball tournament in Los Angeles with teams
from all over the country.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
That came after the tournament, remember this is in twenty nineteen,
there was an after party at a bar on Santa
Monica Boulevard. Ironically, that bar was called Rage. Unlike other
bars along Santa Monica Boulevard, this bar was decidedly non
white and young. Rage, which has been closed and renamed,
(04:43):
is literally keaty corner to the LA Shriff's office.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
Lots of friends of tim were there at that party,
and the after party was at Rage, so not just
people from basketball, but everyone was able to come in there.
We were just surprised to suddenly see that ed Buck
was in front of the entrance and was just coming in.
Speaker 3 (05:07):
Michael could not believe it. There at a bar was
ed Buck.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
Two men died of overdoses in Buck's apartment in an
eighteen month period, but he hadn't been charged in the
deaths Ja Melmore was dead, Timothy Dean was dead, and
walking into a bar full of Timothy Dean's friends is
ed Buck.
Speaker 4 (05:26):
He had no shame to just stroll the streets of
West Hollywood and look for his next victims in his eyes,
like he didn't do anything wrong, But it was just
incredible to see him there on the street. It's just
so furiating, and there's nothing we could do.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
To everyone's surprise, ed Buck's coming in to chill at
the bar.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
Did I say the bar's name was Rage.
Speaker 4 (05:53):
We had to hold people back as well because we
didn't want them to get into it with ed Buck,
because you know, we don't want.
Speaker 6 (06:00):
Our friends to end up in jail.
Speaker 4 (06:02):
And at Buck being being out, you know.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
Michael realized there was something he could do. He could do.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
A documentary film, Jammel and tim was released in twenty
twenty one. It looks into the lives of ed Buck's victims.
Speaker 7 (06:17):
Ed Buck is a predator that masqueraded around just to
hunt down the bodies of black men, someone that was
hiding in plain sight.
Speaker 4 (06:31):
I know that one of the biggest frustrations from friends
and family is the difference of how the victims were
portrayed and how ed Buck was portrayed. At Buck, his
whole resume was being acknowledged in the press, everything that
he has achieved, But with Jammel and tim all the
worst things that they have done in life that was highlighted.
(06:54):
And then it's very easy too, you know, for people
to say like, oh, well, you know, prostitute this or
like they deserved it, or drugs or you know, then
it's very easy to blame or to like protect at bar.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
Yeah, so it's like political donor sex worker. Yeah right, well,
you know, not that that's a very.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
Correct it's it's yeah, the portrayal was day and night
because that human aspect was left out and a lot
of the portrayal. And I think if we create a
human aspect that creates compassion and a reason why we
should care about these.
Speaker 2 (07:33):
Stories, that human aspect that gets left out is what
this podcast is here to do. Highlight what's been left out,
the personal and professional of a man called Timothy Dean
through the eyes of those who knew him and loved him.
Like his friend Richard Martin.
Speaker 5 (07:51):
He was not a drug addict, he was not homeless.
He never hurt a single person, and I think that
that's sometimes is forgotten. I'll say this specially with white men.
As soon as something scandal happens, white men have a
tendency going. I don't know him, I don't know him.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
I don't know him. Who was Timothy Dean?
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Fashionista, baller, benefactor, red carpet afficionado. And why does the
media only want to see him as a victim, a
drug addict or a sex worker. In the rush to
make news, often we don't pause to see the complex
people behind the headlines.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
Well, that's why we're here.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
I'm your host Sinari Glinton, and this is Shattering the System,
the true crime podcast that's about more than crime. Just
because someone's life ends in tragedy doesn't mean their life
is tragic. Today on the program, the life and Legacy
of Timothy Dean, Shattering the System gets started after this message,
(08:58):
this is Shattering the System, your host, Sinari and Glinton.
Speaker 6 (09:02):
Tim Dean was just larger than life. He had this
personality that you knew when he entered a room. You
knew that you knew how he loved you by the
way that he treated you.
Speaker 2 (09:17):
That clip we just heard is from the documentary Beyond
Ed Buck and in this episode we want to talk
about the life and legacy of Timothy Dean. Recently, my
producer Jonathan and I took a drive over the Hollywood
Hills into the San Fernando Valley to meet with a
good friend of Timothy Dean, Richard Martin.
Speaker 8 (09:42):
Richard.
Speaker 5 (09:43):
Yes, hey, how are you?
Speaker 8 (09:46):
I'm good? How about yourself?
Speaker 5 (09:47):
So?
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Okay?
Speaker 5 (09:50):
Sorry?
Speaker 2 (09:53):
We met Richard Barden at his home in Ta Luca Lake.
He's a Hollywood talent manager, mainly of soap opera actors.
You can see heads of actors all around his office,
all faces that looks sort of familiar.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
Stelle Harris from Seinfeld and Missus potato Head.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
She was my first client.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
And there is a tour that is I mean that
must be where something. There's a Missus potato Head from
toy Starter.
Speaker 5 (10:16):
She signed the top of it and signed.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Richard is one of Timothy Dean's closest friends. And as
he shows me around, you can see there are a lot
of photos.
Speaker 5 (10:25):
It's right in the right in here so yes, I
got to fund all these. You know, my husband takes
things away sometimes because I could be a little emotional
at times with things.
Speaker 3 (10:38):
But he's tim and is this you Yeah, that was me.
Speaker 5 (10:42):
That's probably the time when I met Tim.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
In this picture, he looks like he's about in his thirties.
Richard and Timothy met in the nineties at the Golden
Gym in Hollywood. Timothy Dean was tall, had broad shoulders
and an even broader smile. He was handsome, and when
he wasn't on the basketball court, you just might see
him sporting a well tailored suit with a variety of
bow ties. And after they first met at the gym,
(11:08):
Timothy and Richard remained friends and they sort of grew
up together trying to figure out the workings of West
Hollywood in the early aughts.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
And it's clear from.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Our conversation that Timothy ding he really celebrated life.
Speaker 5 (11:21):
One of the things that I always knew every year
is that his birthday wasn't his birthday, It wasn't a
birth week, it was a birth month. He loved to
celebrate his birthday. My husband and I threw his surprise
fiftieth birthday party.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
And we pulled it off.
Speaker 5 (11:37):
How I don't know what we did. If you never
met Jim, he was, you knew he was in the room.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
The thing is he could fill a room physically. He
was athletic.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
You know.
Speaker 3 (11:50):
They met at a gym.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
Timothy enjoyed all parts of Hollywood, though there was an
air of mystery about him. For instance, Richard threw Timothy's
fortieth and fiftieth birthday parties. After going through the math,
Richard realized that the two parties were actually only seven
years apart.
Speaker 5 (12:11):
But it wasn't really his fortieth. He it was his
forty third. But when I found out, when I added
things up to his fifty, I'm like, wait a minute,
this can't be fifty since forty three was only seven
years ago, and they lived with other girl. I like
a party.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Timothy Dean loved the party, and he loved being a
part of Hollywood life. He had a daily access to glamour.
He worked as a fashion consultant at Satsmith Avenue. Before that,
it was Bloomingdale's and Beverly Hills. Those kinds of jobs
put Timothy Dean at the very heart of what we
might call the Hollywood industrial complex. Designers, stylist, celebrities would
(12:50):
have all been among the people that he interacted with.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
We'd like to talk about reality television. We would talk
about every Real Housewives. He had an opinion about everyone
from Orange County to you know, the Real Housewives of
New York.
Speaker 9 (13:06):
We were all shiny hood ornaments. We were all train wrecks.
I know, we were all I've run with a fabulous
circle of people, the New York Magazine and the Real
Social I thought they were like, what the fuck? I
was broken a studio park. We were all flawed.
Speaker 5 (13:21):
Tim always felt like he knew them, and he would
be like, oh, did you He would miss VICKI did,
and all the old girl she'd he would always want
to talk to me about. And I fed into it.
I love I did love it.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
What sense did you have with his family? Well, I
had a different sense.
Speaker 5 (13:45):
Prior to I had met his sister and they weren't
really fully understanding of of him being gay. And I
felt that explained that they just didn't couldn't understand why this.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
Beautiful, you know.
Speaker 5 (14:08):
Man was gay and I don't. I honestly, to this day,
I don't really think they fully understand that. I just
don't think that they fully accepted him being gay.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
How did you see him deal with that?
Speaker 5 (14:21):
He came out to LA to become a totally different person,
and did he succeed in parts of it?
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Yes and parts Now.
Speaker 5 (14:31):
I think he had demons in him that came back
from honestly, and I don't really care because I've expressed
this to his family. I just don't think that he
ever felt fully embraced by his family.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Tailor is oldest time. Timothy Dean would do what gay
men do. He made his own family. He would help
his friends start his management company, doing everything from working
the phones to helping him find clients. And like so
many imposing tall black men, Timothy Dean cared about his
appearances and especially his clothes.
Speaker 3 (15:11):
I mean, he talked to those who knew him.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
He seemed to be on a constant self improvement streak.
Toward the end of his life, He'd be baptized at
the Megachurch one LA, and he would decide to get
his college degree while in his forties, all signs of
a man who was looking very much towards the future.
Speaker 5 (15:29):
I think one of the proudest moments of Timothy Dean's
life is when he graduated from Senemon College two years
He wore that cap and gown all night long, and
he was so proud of himself that he finally accomplished that.
Because he got no help from anybody. He did that
on his own. He had no family to help him.
He just decided that that's what he wanted to do.
(15:52):
He wanted to actually better himself.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
He would get his college degree surrounded by his friends.
He'd write about his accomplishment on Facebook that quote, this
degree will not change the world, but it will be
the first degree earned by anyone in my family. I'm
Scenario Glinton. This is shattering the system. The True crime
(16:16):
podcast that's about more men crowd, This is shattering the system.
I'm Sinnari Glinton.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
That's Timothy Dane.
Speaker 2 (16:33):
You here happily clapping and talking a bit in a
video clip shared by his friend Richard Martin, a video
that was not shared with us by anyone. Is a
part of Tim's life that the media widely reported on.
It was his work as an adult film actor known
by the name Whole Hunter, and many of the stories
about Timothy Dane, there is a prudish way that his
(16:55):
life is written about focusing on his work in porn
and his sex work to the exclusion of everything else.
And I think that this is a part of the
story of Timothy Dean, the pearl clutching that's happened in
relation to his sex work. I can't pretend to clutch
my non existent pearls. As a gay man who's lived
in multiple cities, I've known queer sex workers in Hollywood
(17:18):
or West Hollywood. It's kind of hard not to know them.
I have several friends who have done or do sex work,
and ed Buck isn't alone having paid for sex. I have,
and so have many other gay men. Now, I didn't
want to talk about Timothy Dean's sex work in a vacuum.
Speaker 8 (17:33):
Hi. So my name is Alex Garner. I'm the director
of Community Engagement and Impact. Global Impact is a global
nonprofit working not to advance gay men's health and human rights.
Speaker 2 (17:44):
The reason we wanted to talk to someone like Alex
Garner about sex work is that it's a reality of
the story and how ed Buck was able to lure
men to his home. It's one of the systems ed
Buck used to target a marginalized group. As I talked
to Alex Garner over a Zoom call. We touched on
everything from the economics of sex work to the changing
(18:05):
nature of gay dating. He could relate to the choices
that Timothy being made.
Speaker 8 (18:09):
I mean, I think so much of it has to
do with your relationship to sex, and your relationship to
your body, and your relationship to the idea that someone's
going to pay you money to have sex with them.
And I would have friends that would ask me, oh,
do you think I should do it? And I would say,
if you feel psychologically that you can handle any of
(18:34):
the issues that can come with it, and I mean
issues largely around feeling internally shame and guilt around something
that you're doing that's going to destroy you. Right, if
you're doing a job, any job, and doing that job
makes you feel makes you hate yourself, then that's not
the job for you. And we have everything in our
(18:57):
society and culture that reinforces this idea that if you're
doing sex work, all these list of bad things about you,
immoral and wrong and dirty and perverted. So if you're
able to overcome those things and see it as simply
another job, a job that you can enjoy, a job
that you can be good at, then you can you
(19:19):
can be successful. But if if unfortunately you're you aren't
able to do that, you don't have the skills or
the support to overcome or navigate that, then it can
do harm.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
We don't know whether not Timothy Dane found fulfillment and
doing sex scenes. We do know that money was tight.
That's true of a lot of Angelino's. The average home
in Los Angeles goes for a nine hundred and fifty
thousand dollars or an eight hundred square foot apartment goes
for an average twenty seven hundred dollars a month. And
(19:53):
we all play those games. How much money would it
take for you to cross some boundary? The key to
what Timothy Dean and Jamel Moore could be manipulated, Gardner says,
is they weren't economically vulnerable.
Speaker 8 (20:06):
If this person wasn't feeling economically vulnerable, they'd be less
likely to say yes to that if they didn't really
want to do it. Right, So we say yes to
things all the time if we think it's going to
make us more money. And we do that because we
often are feeling economically vulnerable, right, whether it's in terms
(20:26):
of housing or food or whatnot. So I think that's
the other larger structural issue, is that if people didn't
have to worry about those sorts of things, they would
make very different choices. They would have very different boundaries
when it comes to things like sex work, because those
boundaries can move depending on how hungry you are.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
And that's perfectly reasonable.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
When you're worried about eviction or getting food and you
see forty two thousand homeless people that's according to the
Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, which are disproportionately black. Man,
it's no surprise. Two men struggling to make ends meet,
but do what they had to do.
Speaker 10 (21:05):
But at some point, you know, an interesting story is
that he was contemplating having a child with the lesbian lady.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
That's Otavio today.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
He was Timothy Dean's last roommate, and the time that
he knew Timothy, he saw him contemplating major life changes.
Timothy had gotten a college degree in his forties, and
Octavio says, when Timothy was in his fifties, he was
thinking about having a child.
Speaker 10 (21:31):
And that was an interesting thing because I once came
home at the time that maybe was not expected, and
I sort of opened the door in the middle of
a private moment.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
Of your gay roommate with a woman.
Speaker 10 (21:50):
Yes, yes, yes, And you know clearly might have needed
a little bit of additional stimulation because on TV there
was a gay porn going on. I'm telling the story
because what's interesting to me is that the man was
really trying to find purpose in his life.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
The two men could not have been more different. There
was a twenty year age gap and a difference in
their sexualities, but Octavio says Timothy was someone that he
genuinely came to care for. Octavio says Timothy's generosity helped
him stay in La. Probably the most important gift that
Timothy gave him was that he allowed him to live
in his apartment off the books.
Speaker 10 (22:33):
He lived in this apartment with the rent control, and
I was never on the lease. I should have been
on the lease, you know, because by doing that they
would have had a claim to raise the rent. So
in order to allow me to live with you know
this very convenient rent, et cetera, you know, we we
sort of kept it among us.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Timothy Dan could have charged market rent for Octavio, but
instead charged him a ridiculously low amount O Tavio had
never seen Timothy on hard drugs, so he had no
idea what was in store for him when he got
to the apartment that late January night. He had just
gotten back from visiting his family in Bologna.
Speaker 10 (23:11):
So you know, I had the flight like early, like
seven am from Bologna. My mom and my father drove
me to the airport.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
From Bologna to lax fine economy can take twenty four
hours easy.
Speaker 10 (23:24):
And then you get to la and they broke my
luggage in you know, probably loading it in the plane.
One wheel is missing and literally is not even closing well.
So you know, I leave the airport, I take an uber.
I put all my stuff in, and you know, I
approached Hampton Avenue and I see you know, lights and
(23:45):
trucks and the I'm like, oh, weird, you know, maybe
they're filming something. And the uber driver that was a
Los Angeles native, he's like, no, you know, these are
trucks from the news. Something must have happened.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
And I'm like okay.
Speaker 10 (23:58):
So, you know, I leave the Uber and I'm approaching
the building and literally.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
There is like a crowd of people.
Speaker 10 (24:07):
Seeing me approaching this building, you know, coming closer to me.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
There are those moments when your life it's changed and
you're just waiting to hear about it.
Speaker 10 (24:16):
And I have like these broken legs luggage that I'm drugging,
and I have a bunch of clothes in my arms
and backpack.
Speaker 2 (24:23):
The next thing he knows, he's blinded by lights and
staring down the barrel of microphones.
Speaker 10 (24:28):
You know, they start pointing lights and microphones like I'm like,
what's going on. It's like they asked me, do you
live here? And I'm like yeah, And then somebody takes
out a phone with a picture and it's a picture
of Timothy's like do you know this person?
Speaker 3 (24:42):
Like yeah, it's my roommate. And everybody's like.
Speaker 10 (24:45):
You know, coming closer more, and I'm like, what's going on?
Speaker 2 (24:50):
You know, Otavio has no idea what has happened.
Speaker 10 (24:54):
They really got closer to me just to try to
gather more information, and the first thing they told me
is like we are trying to identify a victim, you know,
like we we think that the person that you know
passed away is this timusit In and we're gonna, you know,
we're gonna show you the picture to pretty much confirm
his identity. I was not believing in my ears, you know,
(25:18):
like I mean, you know, I certainly was like, oh,
you know, you know, I want to know more what's
going on here?
Speaker 3 (25:23):
You know how you know what happened.
Speaker 10 (25:25):
They didn't really have much information at that time. They
just said, you know, he was found dead in an
apartment not far away from here. And the version that
they told me it was like that, you know, I
think there were cameras in the building. You know that
he was let's say reported to enter the apartment or
the building, you know, let's say at midnight, and at
(25:45):
twelve thirty it was declared that by paramedics. So what
happened is that once I went through the crowd of journalists,
et cetera, you know, I entered the building and I
go up to the apartment and literally I'm in the
apartment for two men and said I hear knocking at
the door, and the gentleman that was the manager of
the building is like, you know, like there is a
(26:06):
murder investigation. You are not on the lease, you know,
you can't really stay here. So now it's like one
a m And I have my stupid broken luggage, et cetera.
And I have no time, you know, so I grabbed
like a couple of socks and underwear and I leave.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
After me in the state away two men dead in
(27:22):
one apartment, and yet ed Buck was still allowed to
keep luring men there. On the surface, it's a tourist mecca,
but West Hollywood has a very deep history of organized crime,
corruption and vice. That's on the next episode. Shattering the
(27:46):
System is a production of Macro Studios and iHeart Podcasts.
I'm your host Snari Glynn. You can follow me on
Instagram at scenari plus the Number one. Our executive producers
are Charles D. King, Asha Corpus, Win, Royorecchio, Jonathan Hunger,
Lindsay Hoffman, and Snari Linton.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
That's Me. Our podcast is.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Co written and produced by Ralph Cooper Third and ben
Corey Jones. Erica Rodriguez is our associate producer. Dana Conway
is our archival producer. Chris Mann is the audio engineer,
and sound design and music provided by Chris Mann with
Podshaper and Amy Via Lobos with help from Lisa Pollock.
Our assistant editors are Amie Via Lobos and r Protress.
(28:30):
Special thanks to Jennifer bon Montoni and the Press s
LA Agency. Also special thanks to Porsche, Robertson, Maigas and
Karen Grigsby dates.
Speaker 3 (28:40):
Stay tuned for what's the next shattering the system. See
you next time.
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