Rarely has the manner of a man’s demise been so unbefitting of their life. On the evening of 10 December 1964, soul sensation Sam Cooke dined with friends at Martoni’s restaurant, the Los Angeles hangout of Hollywood A-listers and those that fed off them, flagrantly flashing around the $5,000 in cash he’d made from recent tour dates. After several drinks, he began chatting with a young woman at the bar. Later, he failed to show up at the nightclub his friends had gone to.
Instead, in the early hours of the next morning – 60 years ago this week – Cooke was fatally shot by the manager of the Hacienda Motel, a haunt of sex workers and pimps, amid accusations of kidnap and violence. His killing would eventually be dismissed as “justifiable homicide”.
