David Mack (police officer)

As an athlete, David Mack ran track for Locke High School and was champion at the CIF California State Meet at 880 yards for two years in a row.[2]

He attended the University of Oregon where he ran track with his high school rival Jeff West. After West transferred to UCLA, Mack considered following suit, but was convinced to stay at UO by coach Bill Dellinger.[3] While in college, Mack dated world record holder in the 100m & 200m, Flo Jo.[4] In 1980, as a freshman in college, he finished sixth in the Olympic Trials.[5] Mack won three Pac-10 conference titles in the 800 and in his junior year, the NCAA Division I Championship in the 800 meters.

As a professional, Mack ran for Santa Monica Track Club. He qualified for the United States national team, running the 800 metres in the 1983 World Championships in Athletics but failed to advance to the final.[6] He was the rabbit in Sydney Maree's 1500 meter world record and one week later rabbited Steve Ovett to surpass that record.[7] A stress fracture in his shin caused him to fail to make it out of the heats at the 1984 USATF Championships. In 1985 he ran 1:43.35 seconds which at the time was the second fastest time ever by an American and still ranks 9th fastest.[8] He failed to advance from the heats in the 800m at the 1987 World Championships in Athletics.[9] Beset by fatigue from iron deficiency, his last professional race was in 1988.

In August 1997, Romero became employed at a Bank of America branch near the University of Southern California campus. On November 6, 1997, Mack entered the bank and claimed he wanted to access his safe deposit box. Romero admitted him to the secure area, where he threw her to the floor and robbed the vault of $722,000.

In her capacity as branch assistant manager, Romero had ordered double the usual amount of cash to be on hand at the bank on the day of the robbery. After one month of investigation, Romero confessed to her role in the crime and implicated Mack as the mastermind.[10] He was arrested in December 1997. His two accomplices were never caught.[9][11]

Mack was sentenced to fourteen years and three months in prison and has never revealed the whereabouts of the money.[12] He was released on May 14, 2010.[13][14]

According to the Tupac documentary Assassination: Battle for Compton, citing official legal documents, a reliable jail informant by the name of Ken Boagni, who befriended Rafael Perez in prison, stated Perez claimed the money stolen in the bank robbery was intended to go to Harry Billups, also known as Amir Muhammed, who was friends with Mack, for allegedly carrying out the murder of late rapper Christopher Wallace, also known as Biggie Smalls, because Billups was not paid in full by his contractors, namely Reggie Wright Jr. and David Kenner, because he failed to also murder Sean Combs, the second intended target. Boagni claimed both Perez and Mack were involved in the murder of Wallace, but Billups was the shooter.[15][16]

In April 2007, the estate of Christopher Wallace, a rapper who performed under the name The Notorious B.I.G., filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the City of Los Angeles, which also named Mack, Pérez, and Nino Durden as defendants.

The lawsuit alleged that the officers conspired to murder Wallace, and that Pérez and Mack were present the night of the drive-by shooting which claimed his life on March 9, 1997.[17] In 2010, a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit against the city and the officers.[18]

In the biography film City of Lies, David Mack is played by Shamier Anderson. The film features the 1997 bank robbery.[19]

• Sullivan, Randall (2002). LAbyrinth: A Detective Investigates the Murders of Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G., the Implication of Death Row Records' Suge Knight, and the Origins of the Los Angeles Police Scandal. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press. ISBN 978-0-87113-838-5.
• Scott, Cathy (2002). The Killing of Tupac Shakur (2nd ed.). Nevada: Huntington Press. ISBN 978-0-929712-20-8.
• Scott, Cathy (2000). The Murder of Biggie Smalls. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-0-312-26620-2.

• David Mack at World Athletics