Original subtitles

Propane: Teejay at his age is probably one of

the smartest people I've ever met.

Davis: Teejayx6 is bringing you into the world of scamming.

He's the leader of the scam rap.

He's really scamming.

Teejay: It's just free money just waiting.

What's the point of stopping?

Fuck do that say? I really do this shit.

Propane: He's actually teaching people how to make money.

How does he get away with this stuff?

Teejay is rich. [ Laughs ]

Teejay: I'm just trying to get a platinum plaque for my music.

Just trying to get as rich as I can and stay rich forever.

He been taking money from people all of these years

and nobody's never put hands on him.

It's not right, but we live in a world that's just unfair.

Propane: In order for him to get caught in a scam,

it's gonna be real tough.

I'm not worried about law enforcement at all.

Man: What's going on?!

Back Up! Back Up!

[ Sirens wail ] Man #2: Hey, free Teejay!

Man #3: Woooow!

In the middle of his performance? What the --

♪♪

♪♪

[ Police radio chatter, siren wails ]

♪♪

[ Radio chatter continues ]

♪♪

Teejay: My rapper name is Teejayx6.

I'm from Detroit Michigan, the west side.

I scam people out of money.

♪♪

I would describe myself as a scammer, for sure, 100%,

because I'm-a find a way to scam you out of something.

That's just me, to be honest.

[ Laughs ]

Easy money is the best money to make.

Who wouldn't love that?

SO just the whole process of going through it,

the greatest thing ever.

Rapping is easy, too,

but it's even easier just sitting at home on my ass

on my phone making money.

Every time I make some free money

it just makes me want to do it again...

over and over and over.

I'll tell you stories, you wouldn't even believe it.

I'll tell you how I scammed myself

into a record deal for $10 million.

I scammed them, for sure.

The label has no idea they been scammed.

But I can go into detail about that.

♪♪

Me growing up, when I was younger, like 8 or 9,

I used to bag up parsley leaf and just sell it like weed.

That's a hustler,

like, you just got to do whatever you can

to make some money.

14, 15, I really left my Mama's house.

I got on my own,

just trying to make the best out of it.

But at first I was a good -- good school student, at first.

I was on honor roll and everything.

Uh, the situation I was in.

Like, I really couldn't get the things I wanted

and I seen other people with the things I wanted.

Like, you know what I mean? So I just gave up on school.

School is not for me.

Best hustler I know is my dad.

He taught me how to hustle. He taught me how to be me.

Every single one of my brothers scam shit on Instagram.

That's when the Instagram shit started.

Like, my brother was doing it first,

and then he taught me how to do it.

It's a family thing to hustle. Like, it's just in our blood.

Like, I would wake up and scam.

The most simple scam is the Instagram scam.

You catfish a girl.

This is how you get free flights and everything. You ready?

So, make a fake Instagram page.

Get some pictures from a different girl's account.

You buy some Instagram followers --

like 100K Instagram followers.

You post all the pictures

from the girl's page on your page.

The girl don't exist.

So you just mass follow

and a bunch of dudes just gonna follow you back.

Tell them to be your sugar daddy.

You'll send them nudes and shit like this.

You had the person send you the money -- [Audio distorts]

Woman: Warning -- what he is describing

can lead to incarceration.

[ Audio distorts ] ...something like that.

[ Phone dings ] And then when people come,

so, you know, all them horny ass dudes gonna want to --

[Laughs] you already know, gonna be in our DM.

So you just be like, "Fly me out."

Just get that -- [Audio distorts]

Woman: Warning -- what he is describing right now

may be a crime. This may be criminal.

...believes that it's actually a girl that he's flying out.

[ Phone dings ]

Take the money, you just run away and block the person.

It's simple.

It's never gonna stop working.

There it is. That's how you get scammed.

Most money that I ever made in a day was $2,000.

I was like 13.

This ain't no regular little video shoot, man.

This is real production.

My name is Kasher Quon. I'm 23 and my occupation is rap.

Teejay, I know he had money at 12

'cause I was helping him make it.

But $2,000, $3,000 for a 12-year-old is like,

"I'm 12," you know, "I have more than my mom and dad right now."

Kasher Quon, like, we just always been cool

'cause the -- the scamming and all that,

like, the hustle shit that we was doing.

I first started rapping --

like, I been rapping when I was young,

but I never really took it serious

until one day Kasher Quon took me to a studio.

In today's age, he's like

the top rapper in Detroit, to be honest.

I'm really a legend. Most people will tell you

I'm really a legend in the city, like, I'm not new.

Like, I've always had, you know, a buzz.

Like, I've been around the last seven years.

So I'm like one of the main dudes

that really created all of the whole scam rap.

Teejay's first time in the studio

he didn't know what to say.

You got to say something slower,

or you got to, like, pause and say it.

Teejay: Come on.

I was kind of nervous, 'cause I ain't really wrote no --

well, I used to write music, but at that time, it was serious

'cause I was in the studio

and actually was rapping seriously.

I was kind of nervous.

Rhyme it or just say something new?

Quon: You ain't got to rhyme or anything.

Like, it ain't got to rhyme. Alright, cool.

Just anything, like -- Alright, bet. Come on.

We gonna keep finishing each other's sentences. Alright, good.

I actually gave Teejay a verse that I had in my phone

for like four months that I didn't --

that I was never gonna use. I just gave it to him.

[ Rapping ] ♪ Fuck wrong with this... You smoking angel dust? ♪

♪ You've been rapping for too long, boy ♪

♪ You need to hang it up ♪ ♪ I just beat a... ass ♪

♪ And stuffed his face in the mud ♪

♪ I just beat a... ass and spit in his face ♪

♪ I just beat a... ♪ Aah! Aah!

[ Both scream ] Come on, come on, come on, come on.

Keep your fake ID.

That was so funny.

I created my own YouTube channel and I just started, like,

uploading my own audios and my own videos.

At first, it wasn't doing nothing,

but you just got to just keep going

and build your own fan base.

And then from there, I just took it serious.

♪ My cousin locked up right now... ♪

At the time, I was 14, 15.

I had my own money, smoking, girls, hotels, scamming.

Quon: We didn't really care about clothes around that time,

just candy and weed and --

But a year later...

♪♪

...we started using fake credit cards

to buy designer clothes.

Teejay: I used to always use MSR.

MSR is a card reader machine

that you plug into the computer.

You can Bluetooth it wherever.

You don't need Wi-Fi for nothing.

One day, me and my brother,

we was sitting at the table cooking up some stuff,

scamming, just looking at the card reader machine.

It says, "X6."

My brother gave me the name Teejayx6.

I just went with it.

♪♪

Nope.

You're not gonna find it.

'Cause you're not.

I'm good at the Internet, too.

♪♪

♪♪

Norwood: My name is Chrysantha Norwood.

I am the aunt of Teejayx6.

But I don't call him Teejay.

When Teejay was younger,

he had aspirations of being a police officer.

So it is a little surprising to see him

where he is now, doing what he does.

So, even if he was a police officer,

he would be an amazing police officer.

So I have a scrapbook

and it started, actually, earlier this year.

This is actually a picture of Teejay

with his mom at the hospital when his son was born.

You can see all the joy that she has.

So Teejay is a dad

of his amazing son who is eight months old.

And he is the love of his life.

[ Baby squeals ]

Teejay: I have one son. The best thing in life.

I love it, actually. It's like a mini-me.

And I can teach him --

like, I can teach him better than the shit I'm doing.

[ Laughing and speaking indistinctly ]

I don't want him to have to do the things

that I had to do to get to where I'm at.

I just want him to get to a certain age

and be able to do whatever he wants to.

Don't never have to work a job

or don't never have to just do anything that I had to do.

[ Baby coos ] What?

There was a song, "We were together,"

and someone started to play it.

And he's like, "Whoa, turn that off. My Aunty's here."

He was so respectful of the fact that I was in the space

that he said, "Not that song."

I only know of scam rap and scam rap artists

because that is what, uh, my nephew was billed as.

And as I began to read more about it,

like, so surprised because I know him

and he doesn't use profanity in front of me.

At that time, my page is insanely active.

Every time I, like, post something, it goes up.

Every time I drop music, it goes up.

It feels great, to be honest.

Davis: My name is Yaasiel Davis, also known as Success.

A good friend of mine Lupe Fiasco gave me that name.

Besides, everyone had problems pronouncing my real name

so I was like, "This works." [ Laughs ]

I feel like there's certain artists

and, you know, at certain times, that embrace and -- and --

and narrate what's going on in urban culture.

Biggie in the 90s had a song called,

"Ten Crack Commandments."

Don't get high on your own supply --

sort of rules on how to be a successful drug dealer.

50 Cent early 2000s had a song called "How to Rob."

Robbing and stick up kids,

that was a big thing at the time.

Now scamming is where, you know, it's -- it's an everyday thing.

It's -- It's -- You can't escape scams.

Um, and so Detroit was sort of bringing you

into the world of scamming.

Detroit is one of those cities where your conditions

that you're forced to live in and grow up in

created a special type of creativity,

whether it's music or crime or whatever.

That's Detroit.

♪♪

♪♪

Poody: I'm Poody. I'm the CEO of TF Circle Entertainment.

Yeah, this is a -- this is a light $40,000.

Like, Detroit was beautiful when I was growing up.

The plants and stuff started leaving,

like, the Chryslers and, like, all of that started moving

and people was out of jobs.

That's basically when I first heard about the scams.

That was a lot of fraud that was going on, insurance fraud,

'cause people was burning up the houses

to get that insurance money and never rebuilding them.

You know, once everybody figured it out,

and it was like a big explosion of fraud,

like, everybody was doing it.

Teejay, first time I met him

I just heard he was a local scammer, to be honest.

Teejay is rich [Laughs]...

smart, and mysterious.

[ Engine revs ]

♪♪

Propane: My name is Propane. I'm from Detroit.

I'm a manager,

worldwide international record man.

[ Laughs ]

I've been in the business for like 20 years, right?

I've had, like, artists that were, like, on the verge.

Like, I had Future early. I had Metro Boomin early.

And in this business, it's hard to catch lightning in a bottle.

When I first heard Teejay's music,

Poody sent me "Dynamic Duo."

He's like, "Man, look at this video.

This kid blowing up."

Teejay: "Dynamic Duo" was created

because of a missed flight, actually.

Somebody booked us for a show in Miami.

The flight was at 4:00 p.m., and got to the airport at 3:30.

At the time, we never in our life caught a flight.

And they're like, "Your plane,

it's like, they already in the air."

And I'm like, "So we can't get in the air with them?"

They're like, "No, the plane doors is closed."

Maybe we could just go give this dude some songs or something

for his -- for his time and for his money.

We end up going to the studio.

-Alright, you ready? -Mm-hmm.

Teejay: We went in the studio for six hours,

didn't go to sleep, and made "Dynamic Duo."

I just heard the beat and I just said,

"I'm mad Spirit just delayed my flight.

Me and Teejay had a show to go to in Miami tonight."

♪ I'm mad as hell 'cause Spirit delayed my flight ♪

♪ Me and Teejay had a show in Miami to go to tonight ♪

♪ Mad at the cash -- ♪

Punching means going online,

getting somebody else's info, ordering designer clothes,

electronics, phone bill, anything.

♪ I think the city bad luck, I'm about to -- ♪

Punches, that's all a scam word

for credit card fraud if you listen.

♪ Man, that shit Bobby Brown ♪

♪ Wearin' them old ass fits, boy, that shit out of style ♪

♪ You ain't up no dog shit, I can tell that you down ♪

♪ You need to junk that old car ♪

♪ 'cause that bitch too loud ♪

♪ I just went to Walmart and I tore that bitch down ♪

It went viral.

All the -- everybody was listening to it,

all the rappers that you could think of.

♪ ...with the cheese and you know we staking out ♪

♪ 'Cause when I got your login ♪

♪ I saw the address to your house ♪

Davis: The dog's in the cage, they're in, like,

this trap house-looking apartment,

super grimy.

What the fuck is this? I don't really get it.

Like, I don't understand. Like, he's not rapping on beat.

I'm used to, like, people doing melodic shit.

And I'm listening to it and I hear these, like,

off-beat raps and these shit --

and shit just not mixed.

And I'm like, "Dog, this shit is fuckin' terrible.

What are you talking about?"

Then people were like,

"Man, what the hell is he talking about?

The fuck is you listening to?"

I'm like, "Man, this shit hard.

Y'all don't get it. Y'all don't understand it."

And I'm like, "This shit sucks."

Then he sends me, uh, "Swipe Lesson 2."

I'm like, "Dog, stop sending me shit, dog.

This shit is fucking trash, bro.

Like, I told you, Detroit is over with.

Like, why are these...even rappin' up there?

Like, it's bullshit. The beat suck.

Like, they can't rap on beat."

He's like, "No, you got to listen.

He's actually teaching people how to make money."

And he's like, "He just reads the method off the phone.

He might not rhyme throughout the whole song,

but he's telling you step by step

about how to go get some money."

I said, "Man, what the fuck?"

Okay this is a brand new thing --

which is not a brand new thing, actually,

which people have been scamming in raps for years.

But now it's just --

Teejay just tells you how to do fraud.

That's really the -- the easiest way to make money,

what I just told you. Let me think of another one.

Uh...

Oh, okay.

The Blac Chyna scam promotion.

This is how you sell iPhones, shoes, and shit on Instagram.

So make a fake Instagram page...

Post pictures of shoes and clothes on Instagram

with everything -- iPhones, iPads, Louis bags...

Macbooks and shoes and designer clothes.

The way that I would get people to contact me

is because I would reach out to famous people.

So now, Blac Chyna has a lot of followers.

I would reach out to Blac Chyna,

"Hey, I have $2,500 if you can promote my business."

So they think that this is a legit brand

because Blac Chyna just told me to come shop here.

The person who's ordering is never getting the shoe anyway --

[ Audio distorts ]

Woman: Warning, this may be illegal.

This may be criminal activity. Do not try this at home.

That's how I scammed her at of promotion on her page.

I was doing deals like 4 iPhones for $900.

Like, shit like that -- just unbelievable prices.

People was buying it.

People would be so excited.

"Oh, my God. I'm gonna send it to you right now.

Do you want my debit card number?"

"Sure." [ Laughs ]

She doesn't post me anymore

because people come to her and say,

"That dude that you just posted scammed me.

That shit was hilarious.

Of course.

Nah. I don't really think about that every day.

♪♪

Man: A rapper is accused of stealing 3,000 credit cards

to fund his tour.

Now, feds say the rapper had access

to as much as $15,000,000 in credit

and was jet setting across the country

promoting himself as the next big music act

out of Detroit.

Jones: We're all susceptible to it, every single one of us.

Everyone buys stuff online.

And now with the pandemic that we live in in this world,

I don't see that stopping.

Thanks.

My name's Brian Jones.

I was in law enforcement for 22 years.

I was born and raised here.

I know about every nook and cranny

in the city of Detroit.

My first experience with scamming was on the job,

which was back in 2016.

We did a search warrant on the house.

We're in the back room and there was a lot of, um,

electronic equipment.

Kind of knew what it was,

but I'm like, "Let's take this stuff."

So we were looking into some of the electronics that they had.

And what they were doing is

they were going into the dark web

and that's where you would get the credit card numbers --

like, our credit card numbers.

So they'll buy them in bundles, 50, 100.

They'll pay whatever price it is for it.

So what they'll do is they'll take that number

and they'll actually build up a credit card.

And then they would just start swiping.

Since 2016, scamming and swiping just massively blew up,

evolving into all over the country --

all the way from California, the east coast, you name it.

It runs rampant everywhere.

Swiping is the new narcotic, is what it is.

It is totally the new narcotic.

These young men were very, very intelligent...

very intelligent in doing what they were doing.

We got called down to Indiana on a case.

They were literally making the credit cards

in the backseat of a car.

Probably about 1,000 credit cards that they had.

That's really when my fascination kicked in with it.

Davis: I went on Twitter and searched his name.

I just want to see what people are saying about an artist

when I typically find an artist.

And I saw a bunch of kids just talking about him

and adding him and posting him.

And I was just like, "There's this --

There's this whole wave that I was not familiar with.

What -- What have I been missing?"

And so from that point,

I was sort of infatuated with this -- this kid,

and I was just -- instantly started following him.

If you a scammer and you think, like...

scamming hard or whatever,

trust me, that ain't the case.

[ Chuckles ]

He'd show how to get the money out of the ATM.

Stop fuckin' playing with me.

What the fuck do that say?

I really do this shit.

He would show credit cards. They call it bins.

That is the bank identification number.

Then he was showing what -- he calls them methods,

but I didn't know what a method was.

Method.

A method is a way of getting money.

Method is -- it's like a tutorial step by step

on how to make money off of an app

or just make money from something.

Scammers learn methods -- look, I'm using terminology

that I've heard from Teejay's Instagram page.

Scammers use methods to -- to scam people out of money.

So Teejay has this fraud bible

that he sells his fans and stuff like that.

And it has a bunch of different methods in it --

Cash App Method, Zelle method.

The new fraud bible has the unemployment methods in it.

It's different schemes that come out every month,

you know what I mean?

So Teejay at his age is probably

one of the smartest people I've ever met.

He had cake at 17, like, in the safe.

And he knew how to save his money.

Before Teejay started, like, rapping,

he had already made probably $1 million

just off of Instagram and Twitter itself.

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

No. That's all they're doing is explaining what that is.

They're giving you all the tools in the toolbox on how to do it.

Are all the tools in the toolbox illegal?

No. Alright? They're not illegal...

until you take that hammer out

and you bash someone over the head.

Alright? Now you have your crime.

Swiping is just too easy to go do.

It's just, it's too sexy. It's too sexy. It really is.

When you look at it like, "Wow, like, I all I need

is a credit card number and I can -- I can get this,"

it's -- it's too easy.

This was not in a gang.

This was one individual that was doing this.

They would post nonstop on the scamming that they would do.

They'd actually brag about it that, like,

they weren't gonna get caught.

Can't help themselves. Can't help it.

So we would use the social media

to help further our investigation.

Sometimes the context of the other individuals

that they would have in their posts

that would lead more to our investigation

where, "Oh, we just found out who this person was."

We went and arrested him.

It'd be amazing if they took that brain power

and used it for good. [ Chuckles ]

Yeah, I would describe myself as smart, for sure.

Taught myself a lot.

Quon: Everyone can't be a scammer. You have to be smart.

You got to have some type of knowledge up there.

Like, I was good with hacking, too.

Like, I can hack.

Like, how you're standing right here, right now,

I can hack your phone right now.

It's a thing called a VPN that you use on your phone.

Let's say I'm trying to use your debit card

and your number is linked to get a text message or something.

The bank account just sent the text to your phone

and I got the text right here.

It's -- It's -- I can't really say that on camera,

but it's like the Dark Web.

Propane: So the next song he dropped, "Dark Web"...

♪ The government tried to ban me from the dark web ♪

♪ Tried to ban me ♪

What's your VPN, though?

He told you everything to do, so, like, it was crazy.

"Dark Web" kind of went viral.

♪ I made my first $10,000, took that, and turned it ♪

♪ One day, my bitch got mad at me ♪

♪ Took my clothes and burned 'em ♪

♪ The government tried to ban me from the dark web ♪

I honestly don't know what the Dark Web is.

I know that it exists because I read it.

I don't know what happens there,

and I think I don't really want to know.

There's two kinds of webs.

There's the internet web that we all know about

and then there's the dark web.

And you need a couple search engines to get to that.

They can do it right on their phones.

Their phones, I mean, that's just a mini computer

is all that is.

And they became extremely, extremely experts at it,

is what they did.

Once I saw that video, then I went

and instantly started watching all of his videos.

I saw a video called, "Swipe Story."

♪ Break my cousin off a couple hundred 'cause... ♪

And I saw this kid riding around in a shopping cart [Laughs]

with a TV, and I was just like, "What?"

♪ A the TV in the other hand ♪

♪ Told her I think... ♪

Davis: And then I called my assistant in.

I was just like "Yo, have y'all seen this?"

'Cause my assistant happens to be from Detroit.

So, you know, "You heard of this kid?"

She was like, "I've been seeing his name,

but I'm not familiar with the music."

I knew nothing about him.

I just was hearing about

this urban legend guy from Detroit that was scamming.

Propane: What's different about Teejay is,

he uses the scams to sell his music,

Which grows his views on Instagram

and which grows his views on YouTube,

which gets the label interested and says,

"What the fuck is going on with this kid?

Why is his numbers going up?"

Davis: So I saw the video,

then he was popping up on research reports.

The research report is sort of this snapshot

of who's -- who's popping at that moment --

Shazam, Instagram, Twitter, Spotify,

any of the platforms.

Top -- Top of everybody's list.

because his YouTube numbers, his -- his fan engagement,

and then the streams were all sort of making this whirlwind

on everybody's research report.

Instantly, I started making phone calls to try to figure out

how to get in touch with him and his team.

[ Whirring ]

[ Beep, whirring ]

There's another ten right here.

If you got a Cash App card, DM me.

If you in Michigan with a Cash App card,

DM me right now.

Scamming conventions.

We actually throw scamming conventions.

When we're on tour, we'll go to a town

and we'll just say,

"Alright, today we'll be at this store

or on this part of town."

The fans then will pull up to come and take pictures,

so it'll be like kind of a meet and greet.

[ People shouting ]

People come, and he might airdrop the "Fraud Bible."

He might airdrop some methods.

Yo! Yo!

Man: Y'all make sure y'all get some money

on that fraud book, man.

Yeah.

[ Siren wails ]

♪♪

Teejay: My Dad, every time I make an Instagram post,

my Dad support it. It don't matter what it is.

Like, he's gonna comment fire under it,

just every post I make.

Yeah, sometime he do.

Sometime he calling me to check on me,

tell me he love me and stuff like that.

[ Cat meows ]

♪♪

[ Siren wails ]

Propane: I don't really have a problem with it

just because, like, if that's how he gets his money,

that's how he gets his money.

Like, it may be the right way, it may be the wrong way.

Who is to say that they're right,

and who's to say that they're wrong?

You know what I mean?

Who's to say that fraud is actually wrong?

The government says fraud is wrong.

But, you know, who are you defrauding?

Okay, let's say it like this.

Let's say I got a credit card number and I say,

"Boom. I'm gonna take your credit card

and I am going to go and buy 10 flights to Dubai."

Well, you as the card holder, you can get on your phone

and say, "Hey bank,

I didn't buy these fucking flights to Dubai.

Give me my money back."

You get your money back.

The bank is gonna press the button

and they're gonna get the insurance

and they're gonna get the money.

You're gonna get your money back.

They're gonna get their money. They got paid.

Everybody's good.

Who are you defrauding?

Who are you actually getting down on?

You know what I'm saying?

So, I guess you did just defraud somebody.

You took some money from somewhere,

but where the fuck did you take the money from?

Nobody knows.

I feel like people don't feel like it's wrong

'cause, like, most them people get their money back.

You might just put people

in a fucked up predicament for a while

because their bills might need to be paid

and you spent all their fucking money.

But they eventually gonna get that money back.

Like, it's not right, but...

we live in a world that's just unfair.

So they think it's an innocent crime,

there's no victim to it.

But low and behold, there -- there's victims.

The economic effects is the -- is the largest part of it,

easily, hands down. Look at credit cards.

Look at the interest rate that credit cards charge

for a credit card. Those are ridiculous.

That all makes up for a lot of these losses.

Any story that you want to go into,

they have to recoup their losses somehow,

therefore their product that they sell goes up in price.

Therefore, it costs all of us to do that.

So it affects every single one of us.

Some of the financial institutions,

they give that back.

I mean, there's insurance for that kind of thing.

But it messes up the person's credit.

I mean, there's individuals

that it just literally has ruined their lives

where they can't get a car, they can't get a house.

They can't get -- They can't get finance

and they can't get credit. That's horrible.

That just destroys somebody's life.

That's not innocent. That's not innocent.

They're not someone who's laying on the floor bleeding out.

You're right, they're not.

But they're still a victim to this.

And it's not just one person. We're all the victim to it.

We're all a victim to the -- to the fraud.

It affects everybody.

It's a huge economical trickle-down effect.

♪♪

Woman: What have you been doing the last couple of days?

Teejay: Scamming. Making more money.

Stacking more money day by day.

How much have you made in the last few days, tell me?

$40,000. What?!

Ever since I seen you, like $30,000, $40,000.

Right, then it's over? Yeah.

No, I'm young as hell. I-I...

There's no reason for me to be thinking like,

"Just 10 more thousand, it's over."

I need a couple -- couple more.

No. Law enforcement ain't shit.

Most I can go to jail --

It's a white collar, like I was saying.

Like, it's white collar.

Most I'll do is probably 5, 10 years.

I'm not about to do no life.

5, 10 years is still a lot of your life.

I know. I know. I know it's a lot of life,

but I know what I'm doing, as well.

Law enforcement is not watching me.

I'm not that important.

It's people who's crazy, like, off of...

let's say, like, drugs and shit.

You know what I mean? It's more shit --

These people out here is murdering people.

Like, you worried about a little scamming dude.

Like, it's -- it's certain shit

that -- that they should be worried about.

And I'm not one of them.

Jones: Yeah, that's the attitude they have.

"I'm not gonna get charged with a lot.

I'm not doing any time in the box.

If I do, it's gonna be a little time in the box."

It comes from the local and the state level

of being charged.

People want to see these people

that are doing these violent crimes

locked up and behind bars.

And then you have somebody who's doing a,

if you want to say, a non-violent crime,

they're gonna put more of their effort

into the ones doing the violent crime.

But we could come in and step in

and maybe charge them federally.

They get hit harsh with their sentences --

harsh with their sentences.

Um, 15, 20 -- 20 years with them.

And there were actual individuals

that we're crying in the courtroom

when they found out what they were getting hit with.

A lot of those cases led to proffers

and cooperations that we've had.

When they're looking at so much time

and then that just snowballs and snowballs and --

to catching other individuals doing it.

We are watching. We're watching what goes on.

And if they think that we're not watching,

somebody else is watching. You know?

And when somebody else's -- jealousy's another one.

When they see somebody else bringing in all that cash and,

"I don't want them to have all that,"

they might flip on them. So, yeah.

We're -- We're watching somewhere along the line.

Davis: Teejay was at the top of everyone's research report.

It's my job to figure out, you know,

how do I get this deal done

because the competition is fierce.

At the time, he hadn't had a lot of shows,

but I was waiting for, like, his first show

just to see how the fans would react

and how many kids would show up and that sort of thing, so...

Propane: We got a show August 10, 2019.

LA at the beginning of August.

It's like the end of summer, it's a vibe.

You got to think of what the weather is,

what the vibe is like in LA.

Like, LA in August is like the wave.

So I'm like, "This show's about to be the shit."

[ People chanting, "Hey!"]

♪ The government tried to ban me from the dark web ♪

♪ I downloaded Tor Browser then got back in ♪

♪ Went and got a VPN, just bought another BIN ♪

♪ I'm-a keep searching these bitches on my site ♪

Man: What's going on?

[ Music fades, indistinct speaking ]

Hold on! Wait, hold on.

What the fuck is going on? Like, what's -- what's going on?

[ Crowd boos ]

Oh, shit. Hold on, bro!

What's going on?

[ Indistinct shouting ]

Hold on, bro!

-Fuck twelve! -Fuck twelve!

[ Indistinct shouting continues ]

-Are you serious? -That shit crazy.

Back up! Back up!

-Are you serious? -Oh, dude.

Man #2: In the middle of a fucking show, bro.

Man #3: Hey, free Teejay!

-Free Teejay! -Free Teejay!

Free Teejay, man.

-Fuck twelve! -Wooow!

[ Indistinct shouting ]

Man: In the middle of his performance? What the...

♪♪

Man #2: They just rushed in there.

That was like an actual Marshal, bro.

Man #3: Did you see their car and shit?

What was it like? Like a fucking real ass cop car?

-They almost ran me over, bro. -It was a undercover.

It was an undercover? Yeah.

They rode away in an undercover, bro.

Like they rode away in an undercover.

They just came and took my... Hey, free Teejay!

Man: Free Teejay. Send them up.

I saw a video of Teejay getting arrested

and I was like, "Yo, was he arrested?"

People love seeing people get shot.

People's records sell when they get killed.

And people's records sell when they go to jail.

Back up!

In order for us to shake the industry up,

we create the jail situation without him going to jail.

None of that is true.

Nothing is true.

♪♪

So I get online and I find this dude

that does, like, the casting.

He ends up sending some police officers.

Don't worry about it, dog. We paid the police off.

So we hiring the police officers

to come and do this shit.

Let's go, move!

Man: Free Teejay!

Just seeing everybody natural react,

it was best we didn't tell everybody.

For the crowd, that was the reaction

that I knew would happen for the crowd.

Man #2: Poody, call the lawyer! Free Teejay!

A fan in the audience is sitting here filming this shit.

These people are gonna be looking

and that's the shit that goes up on the jumper.

-Free Teejay! -Free Teejay!

-Free Teejay! -Woooow!

Propane: And it went viral.

[ Text tone plays ]

♪♪

[ Laughing ]

♪♪

[ Text tone plays ]

For the next couple days,

we just played it like he was in jail.

[ Text tone plays ]

A couple rappers had called me and was like,

"Oh, yeah, this kid is dope, man.

What's up with him? Is he really locked up?"

I'm like, "Man, no, he ain't locked up.

Look, FaceTime him."

"Man, I need a verse right now.

Send me a verse. Let me get a verse."

I'm like, "Shit, how much you got?"

[ Laughs ]

So you just paid us.

[ Laughs ]

Once it was like, "Alright, cool, now he's out of jail,

like, man, we gonna do it again."

Tell your fans, like,

"I know I just went to jail for this shit.

I don't give a fuck. I'm still doing this shit."

I don't give a fuck. I just got out today.

I'm back on my grind.

Thought the cops was gonna stop me?

Get the fuck out of here. I'm back on it.

And then when we get to the bank

I'm-a get the money from the teller.

I want you to walk up the teller and actually receive the money

and walk out of the bank.

Yo, this shit ain't no game.

And we just used his Instagram

just to troll the shit out of his fans.

[ Laughs ] I hate to say that.

Was that fake, or was -- you know.

Did he -- did I get scammed there?

What -- What was that?

Labels, was in my e-mail like -- like a magnet.

Like, every single label in the world was in my e-mail.

♪♪

We started taking label meetings.

Then there was the press.

♪♪

There was a "New York Times" article,

"Complex," it was everywhere.

Every label had offers on the table.

There was a bidding war.

It just kept going up.

I was definitely losing sleep at night.

We're gonna lose this deal.

It was just funny as hell. [ Laughs ]

Then we had a call from Success

and he was like, "Is Teejay locked up?

Is he gonna make the meeting?"

Yeah, "Was he arrested?"

So when I reached out to the team,

Propane, he was like, "No, we good now."

"Yeah, don't worry about that. He's gonna make the meeting.

We'll -- We'll figure it out."

Davis: I eventually flew him into New York

and met with him with his team.

And I not-- first thing I noticed

he came in with a ski mask.

I was confused. Like, "What happened here?"

Why was he getting arrested? Is this to be continued?

And we kind of got to the meeting

and we kind of filled him in on what was going on.

Was like, "Yeah, that was a big ass troll."

And I was like, "Wait a minute. What?"

[ Laughs ]

[ Laughs ]

[ Laughs lightly ]

[ Laughs ] And they're like,

"What the fuck y'all got going on?"

I feel like I was hoodwinked and bamboozled.

But he's the godfather of scam.

The fact that he put it together

to the point where every label was trying to sign it,

that was genius.

This kid really has his whole plan thought out

from start to finish

and that's what brought him to the top.

And I just happened to be the guy that met him at the top

and signed him.

I do feel like Teejay sort of scammed his way to the top.

I feel like people like myself fell right into it.

I get it [Laughs], you know?

But I was like, "Okay, I won't be finessed again."

[ Text tone plays ]

Teejay: I be telling people I signed for 50 million,

but I was lying.

[ Laughs ] Ten million.

Woman: Yeah, but really real. For real, for real.

Ten million.

I only got eight million of that.

I had to pay taxes.

Because I don't want the IRS on my damn ass, that's why.

I don't want them at my front door

kicking my shit down.

[ Sighs ] He doesn't do fraud anymore.

He done tell me -- he tells me he doesn't do fraud anymore,

so, I mean...

But he'll give you, uh, some literature

that could possibly tell you how to do fraud.

But is that illegal?

I don't know.

I know that since he's been signed,

it's been more narrating the art and the culture of scamming.

Is he still out committing scams?

I don't know.

♪♪

Like, I actually stopped for a period of time.

But I can't stop, to be honest.

It's just free money just waiting.

If I was to stop, it was just shows and shit

and every -- all that got closed down

'cause of the coronavirus,

so it was just -- I was missing out on free money.

♪♪

They can't outsmart us. It's just a matter of time.

The greed catches up to them and they can't stop doing it.

We're watching. We're watching them.

The universe is gonna unfold

and they eventually, eventually will get caught.

For me as a manager,

it's kind of scary because it's like,

I ain't gonna lie, I can see it happening.

There's more than enough songs

in the event that he was ever to get arrested,

we'd probably have albums worth of stuff.

But that's never been a concern of mine or anybody at the label.

Teejay: I think life already planned, to be honest.

But I wouldn't even be where I'm at right now without music.

The reason I started scamming is because I was broke.

I didn't have nothing.

But now I got millions.

My dad, I just bought him a house.

It's the greatest thing ever.

♪♪

I don't have a record deal.

That other person has a record deal.

Scamming.

And I scammed the record label. Want to know how?

I put a fake signature on the -- on the -- on the contract.

That's not my real name on the contract.

So I ain't got to listen to that label one time in my life.

End of story [Laughing] is that.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪