For years, Telly Hankton built an empire that seemed untouchable. Millions flowing in, loyalty locked in, and silence enforced at every level. On the outside, it looked airtight, but behind that power was a ticking clock because when things start falling apart, it didn’t happen the way anyone expected.
Not through a dramatic raid or sudden betrayal from the streets. Instead, the cracks came from within. And once they started, there was no stopping what came next. October 2011, middle of the day, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu steps out onto the neutral ground of South Claiborne Avenue, one of the busiest stretches in the city.
Traffic moving, people watching, cameras rolling. You don’t pick a spot like that unless you’re trying to make noise, and that’s exactly what this was, a message. Because just days earlier, something brutal had gone down. Curtis Matthews, a manager at the Jazz Daiquiri bar, had been murdered.
But here’s where it gets heavy. Curtis wasn’t even supposed to be the one in the crosshairs. He was only there because his brother John, the actual owner, had already been forced out of the city after surviving something straight out of a nightmare. 17 shots. That’s what John took at his own home on Gentilly Road. 17. And somehow, he lived.
So now you have to ask, why him? Because John had testified. He spoke up in court against Telly Hankton in a case tied to the murder of 23-year-old Darnell Durney Stewart. And once that happened, he was marked. When they couldn’t reach John, they went after Curtis instead. That’s the kind of chain reaction this was. Now, word on the street pointed in another direction, too.
Jesse Reed and Darnell Stewart was said to be behind the hit on Cup Hankton, Telly’s cousin, his right-hand man, and usually you’d expect the system to step in, lock things down, handle it clean. But, that didn’t happen. So, the Hankton cousins, Telly and Andre, decided they weren’t waiting on anybody.
And this is where things turn cinematic. We’re talking about a full-on street pursuit. Andre behind the wheel of a Mustang, locked in. He spots Stewart, and instead of backing off, he floors it. The Mustang slams straight into Stewart’s car. And what happened next, witnesses couldn’t even believe what they were seeing.
They said the impact launched Stewart 25 ft into the air. He cleared a telephone pole, spinning, flipping, losing his shoes midair. Even his clothes couldn’t stay on him. It was chaos in slow motion. Then came the crash. Stewart slams into a utility pole, then hits the pavement hard.
The kind of impact that should end everything right there. But, it didn’t. Somehow, he was still alive, broken, barely breathing, but alive. And that’s when Telly stepped in. He walks up and empties the clip, 11 shots, four of them to the head. At that point, it didn’t even feel real anymore. The crash alone was already something out of a horror scene.
But, this, this was something else entirely. No mercy, no pause, just a cold finish in the middle of the street. Then, just like that, Andre’s gone. He doesn’t wait around, doesn’t look back. He disappears. But, here’s the mistake. Somebody saw everything. A nearby bakery shop owner had a clear view, and more importantly, cameras rolling.
That footage, it went straight to the police. And just like that, the whole situation got a lot tighter. At that point, the city had seen enough. Mayor Mitch Landrieu steps back up, this time with zero sugarcoating. Cameras on him again, tone serious. And he makes it clear, they’re coming. Not just words, either.
He backs it up, pulling $10,000 out of his own campaign funds, and handing it to Crime Stoppers trying to track down whoever killed Curtis Matthews. So now the pressure is everywhere. Streets talking, police watching, city leadership stepping in, and just like that, Telly Hankton isn’t just moving in the shadows anymore. He’s front and center.
But here’s the thing, Telly Hankton didn’t just become a criminal mastermind overnight because of what happened at the Jazz Daiquiri Lounge. There’s a much deeper history there. Federal prosecutors would later say that Telly Hankton had been laying the foundation years earlier building what they claimed was a $43 million drug empire out of a small unassuming house on Josephine Street in Central City.
Now think about that for a second. Something that big moving out of something that small. That kind of operation doesn’t stay quiet for long. And once people start noticing, the pressure comes with it. April 2006, that pressure shows up. A man named Darwin Bessie rolls through and tries to take Telly out in a drive-by, but it doesn’t land the way he planned because just 1 week later, Bessie is found dead on Martin Luther King Boulevard.
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And just like that, the streets start talking. The word spreads fast. Telly handled it. Payback, clean and simple. One of those moments that sets the tone. If you take your shot, you better finish it. After that, the Hankton name starts carrying a different kind of weight. Then June hits, just 2 months later, and this is where everything escalates.
Headlines everywhere start screaming about what they called the Central City Massacre. Five teenagers found dead inside an SUV right there on the corner of Josephine and Danneel. And that location, everybody knew that was Hankton territory. So it didn’t take long before his name got pulled into it. And the way witnesses described it, it didn’t even sound real.
An SUV pulls up, regular moment, nothing out of place until it is. Telly allegedly walks up to the vehicle and shoots the first guy in the head. Then he turns and shoots the driver. The car starts rolling, slowly drifting forward, and instead of backing off, he keeps moving with it, walking alongside the SUV one step at a time, firing into it, picking off the remaining three people inside.
When it’s over, he doesn’t panic. He just runs back to his mother’s house. And keep in mind that this is all happening in a city that’s already hurting. Hurricane Katrina had already left New Orleans shaken, exposed, trying to rebuild. People were still dealing with loss, with chaos. Then this happens. Five young men, Marquis Hunter, Arsenio “Little Man” Hunter, Warren Love, Simeon “E-Ram” Taylor, and Reggie “Putty” Danceler cut down in a storm of bullets.
Not just another crime, but something that hit different, something that made people stop and really look at what was happening in Central City. It got so bad, the state had to step in. Governor Kathleen Blanco calls in the National Guard and state police just to try and calm things down.
That’s how far it had gone. But when it comes to who actually pulled the trigger, that’s where things split. Officially, a Hankton associate known as Mike Mike Anderson took the fall for it. Case closed on paper. But federal prosecutors, they never agreed. To this day, they stand on it. They believe Telly was the one who carried it out.
Then 2007 comes around and things don’t slow down, they just shift. April, just a normal stop at the Red Rooster Snowball stand on Clara Street. Donnell Stewart, Jesse Reed, and Kareem Peters weren’t looking for trouble, they were just grabbing something quick. But timing can flip everything. Telly and his cousin Troy happen to spot them, and instead of letting the moment pass, they act on it.
As Stewart and the others try to pull away, gunfire suddenly erupts, Shots ripping through the car before anyone can really react. When it’s all over, Kareem Peters is the one who’s been hit. He survives, but in that world, surviving doesn’t mean it’s done. It just means it’s delayed because there’s a rule everybody understands, even if nobody says it out loud.
Blood gets answered with blood, and it takes 8 months, but it comes. December 2007, Gert Town, middle of the day, George Cup Hankton, Telly’s cousin, is just out there washing his car. Then Stewart, Reed, and Peters pull up, and they open fire right there at the car wash. Cup is gunned down.
That’s their payback, but if they thought that closed the book, they misunderstood the whole story because you don’t touch a Hankton and walk away clean. The response was already building, already in motion, and what came next, what happened at the Jazz Daiquiri Lounge, wouldn’t just add more bodies to the count. It would completely upend the Hankton empire for good.
May 2008, 5 months after Cup Hankton is killed, and you can feel the shift. The streets are tight, tense, like everything’s one bad moment away from snapping. Telly Hankton and his cousin Andre reach a point where waiting isn’t an option anymore. They track down Donnell Stewart outside of daiquiri bar and handle it right there.
Just like we touched on earlier, police move in, of course. Telly is arrested for the murder, and for a second, it feels like things might finally slow down, but they don’t. He posts a $1 million bail and walks right back out like nothing really changed. Now, here’s the twist. Instead of jumping right back into the chaos, he pulls back.
With a whole operation to run, Telly spends about a year focusing on business, but by June 2009, that pause is over. Jesse “22” Reed is out on Terpsichore Street just posted up on the porch of an abandoned house. Nothing flashy, just another day. What What doesn’t know is he’s being watched. Telly pulls up, but this time he’s not alone.
Riding with him is Walter Urkel Porter, a new face but hungry. A contract killer trying to prove himself, trying to earn his place. He’s been chasing this opportunity knowing Telly has enemies lined up one after another. This job is worth $10,000 and they’ve got back up, too. Kevin Jackson in the mix ready to add extra firepower. Everything about this is planned.
Telly is pointing out the spot showing exactly where 22 usually sits. Then, just like that, it moves. Doors swing open, they jump out, and the shooting starts. Telly gets it going, but Porter, he takes it somewhere else entirely. He stands over Reed and just keeps firing. Not a few shots, not enough to get the job done.
50. 50 rounds into one man. Jackson joins in, too, adding more shots before they all scatter and disappear. And when it’s over, it’s not just a killing, it’s a statement. Investigators later count 59 shell casings scattered across that porch, evidence of just how far they took it.
Porter wasn’t just doing a job, he was trying to prove something, trying to show he was the one you call when it really matters. But in all that chaos, they slipped. They left a witness, and that changes everything because the violence doesn’t stop there. It shifts. Now it’s tied to someone else, someone who saw too much, a man named Hassan Williams.
He was there the night Jesse Reed was killed, saw it up close. And when he talks to police, what he describes is chilling. June 20th, 2009, Williams and Reed pull up to a house. Reed stays in the car wrapping up a phone call while Williams steps out and heads toward the porch, just trying to grab something to eat.
It feels like a normal moment, nothing unusual, nothing urgent. Then something catches his attention. A car turns onto the street and suddenly its headlights go off. That’s the kind of detail that instantly feels wrong. The car keeps moving, slow and quiet, almost like it doesn’t want to be seen.
As it creeps closer, Williams starts to focus on the driver, and that’s when it hits him. It’s Telley Hankton. There’s barely any time to process it before Williams can fully react, the car suddenly surges forward. Everything explodes at once. Williams and Reed take off in opposite directions, running on instinct, but the gunfire is already chasing them down.
Shots ripping through the air. Later, Williams finds out the truth. Reed didn’t just get hit, he was shot 50 times. When police bring Williams in and show him a lineup, there’s no hesitation, no second-guessing. He points straight at Telley, identifies the car, mentions there were two other people inside, one driving, two jumping out to finish the job.
A week later, he steps in front of a grand jury and repeats the whole story under oath, every detail, every moment. And just like that, by doing the right thing, he had essentially signed his own death warrant. July 4th, 2009, while most people are outside celebrating, Hassan Williams is just stepping out of his house on Dwyer Road in New Orleans East.
But, he doesn’t make it far. Walter “Urkel” Porter is already there, waiting. The ambush is quick, calculated, and final. Hassan is killed before he even has a chance to react. When investigators run the ballistics, the result is chilling. The bullets pulled from Hassan’s body are an exact match to the ones used in the killing of Jesse “Too Too” Reed.
Same weapon, same hand behind it. And just like that, the pattern becomes impossible to ignore. Porter wasn’t acting on impulse, he was working, paid $10,000 to silence a witness and close a loose end. With most of his rivals either dead or buried, Telley Hankton finally has space to breathe.
The chaos settles just enough for him to focus on what built his name in the first place, moving product and making money. According to federal estimates, his crew is pushing between 10 to 15 lb of cocaine every single week. The operation itself isn’t flashy, but it’s steady and effective. Mules run back and forth along I-10 carrying shipments from Houston into New Orleans.
Once the product lands, it gets broken down into smaller quantities, passed through mid-level distributors, and eventually makes its way to street dealers. It is a simple pipeline, but it keeps cash flowing and the machine running. But even with all that momentum, there is still one problem Telly cannot ignore.
John Matthews, the owner of the Jazz Daiquiri Lounge, has seen too much. He wasn’t just another name floating around in the background. He was an eyewitness to the killing of Darnell Stewart, and more importantly, he wasn’t backing down. Matthews was a Vietnam veteran, and he had already made it clear he was willing to take the stand and testify.
For Telly, that made him a liability that couldn’t be left alone. So, he turned to the one person he trusted to handle it, Walter Urkel Porter. At $10,000 a hit, Porter didn’t ask questions. On the night of October 24th, 2010, he set out with one goal, eliminate John Matthews. And to make sure nothing went wrong, he brought backup, Thomas Squirt Hankton.
Inside his home on Glengarry Road, Matthews is trying to relax after a long shift at his bar on Dauman Road. But there is a weight on him, a feeling he can’t shake. He knows what he’s involved in. He knows what kind of people he is up against. He looks at the small two-shot pistol nearby and realizes the truth.
If they come for him, that won’t be enough. So, he gets up to grab something stronger. That decision saves his life. Moments later, the front door explodes open. Gunfire tears through the house. Shotgun blasts mixed with what sounds like automatic fire. But Matthews does not freeze. He fights back.
Despite being outgunned, he returns fire and manages to push them off. Porter and Hankton are forced to retreat, but the damage is already done. Matthews has been hit 17 times. He spends 2 weeks in a coma, hovering between life and death. When he finally wakes and stabilizes, he does not hesitate.
He leaves Louisiana immediately, putting distance between himself and the people who tried to kill him. Before he goes, he hands control of his daiquiri business on Claiborne Avenue to his brother Curtis, just to keep things running until he can sell it and move on for good. But walking away does not mean he is done.
9 months later, John Matthews makes a decision that most people wouldn’t. He comes back, back to Louisiana, back into the same environment that nearly killed him, because he is not running anymore. He wants to face Telly Hankton in court and testify about what he saw. When the trial begins, the tension inside the courtroom is immediate.
The prosecution understands exactly what kind of risk Matthews is under and tries to have the courtroom cleared before he takes the stand. But the judge denies the request. It is a decision that raises serious questions. Matthews has already been targeted once. The stakes are high, and yet the court refuses to limit exposure.
Even after a second attempt by the prosecution, the answer remains the same. No. So Matthews takes the stand in front of a full room. You can see it on him. He is shaken, emotional, carrying the weight of everything he has survived. As he speaks, he walks the court through the events leading up to the murder, reliving moments that clearly still haunt him.
At one point, he admits he was watching Telly closely because he did not want to die. His focus, his fear, everything was tied to survival. He talks about thinking of his wife, about trying to hold onto details even as panic set in. When asked how he feels now, he breaks down. The experience is still raw, still painful, and it is clear that being there is the last place he wants to be.
Some people might try to label what he did, but the reality is more complex. He was not just pointing fingers. He was standing up against something dangerous, something that had already tried to take his life. By testifying, he was putting himself right back in the line of fire, and that takes a level of courage most people will never understand.
On the other side, the defense tries to create doubt. Two women, Danielle Hampton and Sana Johnson, testified that Telle was with them at the W Hotel when the murder happened, but their story does not hold up. Investigators uncover evidence showing Hampton had known Telle for years, contradicting her claim that they had just met.
Under pressure, she eventually admits she lied under oath and had been paid to support his alibi. Sana Johnson, however, continues to stand by her version of events, with her lawyer insisting she did nothing wrong. Then things take an even stranger turn. In what feels like something out of a crime film, a member of the Hankton family attempts to infiltrate the jury pool during the retrial.
The exact goal is unclear, but the message is not. This is a family willing to go to extreme lengths to protect its own. When it comes to the verdict, the process is anything but smooth. The first trial ends in a hung jury, leaving everything unresolved. But the second trial brings a different outcome.
This time, the state secures the conviction they were after. However, that victory comes at a cost. Just 3 days after Telle Hankton is sentenced to life in prison, the retaliation begins. October 15th, 2011, Curtis Matthews is standing outside the Jazz Daiquiri Lounge, the same business he stepped in to manage for his brother.
He is ambushed. Walter Erkel Porter opens fire, shooting him 14 times. Curtis never had a chance. Afterward, one of his relatives speaks to reporters but refuses to give their name. The fear is too real. Even speaking carries risk, and they make it clear they do not want to put anyone else in danger.
That silence says everything. It shows just how deep the fear runs, how powerful the intimidation is, and how difficult it is for anyone in that environment to feel safe speaking out. Even as authorities promise to clean up the streets, moments like this reveal the truth. Removing the leaders does not immediately stop the violence.
The system keeps moving, and the consequences keep coming. The mayor said it plainly, Telly Hankton had terrorized New Orleans for far too long, but even with that chapter closing, the targeted killings and the elimination of witnesses left behind one undeniable reality. This problem was nowhere near solved.
With Telly Hankton officially sentenced to spend the rest of his life behind bars, it might have seemed like the storm was finally passing, but in reality, that was only the beginning of a much larger crackdown. Law enforcement didn’t ease up, they leaned in. What followed was a full-scale, coordinated effort.
The NOPD, the FBI, the ATF, and the US Attorney’s Office all came together, working alongside local investigators with one clear goal: dismantle whatever remained of the Hankton operation. This was no longer just about one man or one case. It had become a defining moment for the entire network and anyone tied to it. Federal authorities had been watching the group for years, quietly gathering pieces.
But after the murder of Curtis Matthews, the urgency shifted, the situation escalated, and the full weight of federal power came down hard. Pressure built quickly, and it showed. New Orleans Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas moved fast, publicly naming Walter Urkel Porter as the primary suspect in the killing.
With the spotlight now directly on him and nowhere left to hide, Porter turned himself in just two days later. Behind the scenes, the case continued to grow. For the next year, federal investigators worked methodically, stacking evidence, connecting names, and building something much bigger than a single charge.
Then, on October 19, 2012, everything came to a head. US Attorney Jim Letten’s office unveiled a sweeping 22-count indictment targeting 13 key figures connected to the Hankton organization. The charges painted a clear picture. Prosecutors linked the leadership of the group directly to violence on the streets, naming Telly Hankton, Thomas Squirt Hankton, Andre Hankton, Walter Erkul Porter, and Kevin Jackson as the core enforcers behind a series of high-profile killings.
Those included the murders of Curtis Matthews, Darnell Stewart, Jesse Reed, and Hassan Williams. The breakdown of the indictment showed where the government believed the weight of responsibility lay. Walter Porter, identified as the primary assassin, was named in 14 of the 22 counts. Telly Hankton and Thomas Hankton each faced nine counts, reflecting their central roles in the operation.
But, the case did not stop with the men carrying out the violence. It reached into the family itself. Telly’s mother, Shirley Hankton, was also charged. Prosecutors accused her of lying to a grand jury, storing large quantities of cocaine for her son, and participating in both conspiracy and money laundering.
The investigation made it clear that this was not just an organization, it was a network deeply rooted in family ties. Even with key figures arrested and facing serious federal charges, the violence did not simply disappear. In New Orleans, the ripple effects continued. In August 2014, Kareem Peters, known on the streets as K-Ice, was found dead inside a bullet-ridden Acura at an apartment complex in New Orleans East.
His story was already tied to the earlier conflicts. Years before, he had survived an attempted hit by Telly Hankton. Later that same year, he retaliated by killing George Cup Hankton. For a time, he managed to stay alive, but nearly 7 years later, that past finally caught up with him.
Just months later, in December 2014, another killing shook Central City. Morris Sparkman was found dead on a balcony, the result of a robbery gone wrong. He had attempted to rob two members of the Hankton family during an underground dice game, not realizing who he was dealing with. The consequences were severe.
Julius Hankton eventually pleaded guilty to manslaughter and now faces a 40-year sentence. Quinton Hankton was also linked to the case and is currently serving 25 years on a separate heroin distribution charge. Even with leadership dismantled, the name still carried weight and the violence tied to it continued to surface.
By June 2016, the legal process reached its final stage. A 3-week federal trial, overseen by Judge Martin Feldman, laid out the full scope of the operation. When it concluded, Telly Hankton was convicted on three counts of murder in aid of racketeering tied to the deaths of Darwin Bessie, Darnell Stewart, and Jessie Reed.
Walter Erkel Porter, his most trusted enforcer, was also convicted on three federal murder charges. By the end of that year, both men received life sentences. Other members of the organization were forced to make their own decisions as the case unfolded. Some chose to cooperate, accepting plea deals in the face of overwhelming evidence.
Others did not escape the same fate as Telly. Andre Hankton and Kevin Jackson were both sentenced to life in prison. Still, cooperation came at a cost. Gerald G-Rock Howard, who testified against Telly, was later shot and killed near Freret Street in Uptown. Bobby Bass Keen, another individual who cooperated with authorities, met a similar end.
Their deaths served as a stark reminder of the risks involved in speaking out. Today, Telly Hankton is 43 years old. He remains incarcerated at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, confined to a small 6×9 foot cell. The prison itself carries a heavy legacy, once a slave plantation and long known for its harsh conditions and violent past.
And that is where he will spend the rest of his life.
