Movie stand-in Jameelah Elena Michl fell so madly in love with her film’s beautiful director that she began stalking her — even brandishing a Glock — and when the director didn’t return her affection, the extra shot to death the Hollywood social justice do-gooder she believed to have gotten in her way.
By TONY CASTRO
There are no angels in Hollywood. There is too much proof of that. But if there were, Michael Latt would have been at the forefront. No one outside of Hollywood really knew his name. It wasn’t on box office marquees. He wasn’t anyone in front of the camera or behind it. But he had grown up in Hollywood. He knew it for what it was. And he wanted to make it better and more inclusive for people who had not grown up as fortunate as he had.
If there were a thing such as Hollywood royalty, Michael would’ve been a part of it. His father, David Michael Latt, is the co-founder of The Asylum, the film industry’s most prolific independent film studio. His mother, Michelle Satter, is one of the founding directors of the Sundance Institute’s artists programs and is expected to accept an honorary Oscar next year for that work. His brother,Franklin Latt, is head of talent at the powerful Creative Artists Agency.
Michael Latt himself became a high-profile entertainment marketing consultant whose firm, Lead with Love, focused on social impact and in assisting social justice movements. He also also worked with Common on the Oscars campaign for the song “Letter to the Free.” Together, they launched a concert prison tour and helped developed Common’s nonprofit Imagine Justice.
But all that changed on the evening of November 27. Jameelah Elena Michl, 36 — a woman with no apparent connections to Latt and described by police as just one of the tens thousands of homeless people stranded on the streets of Los Angeles — broke into his Mid-Wilshire home and gunned him dpwn in an apparent cold-blooded murder.
But in Hollywood rarely is anything as it appears to be. In the days after the shooting, it soon became apparent that Jameelah Elena Michl was hardly just another homeless person and possibly not even homeless at all.
Michl had worked as an extra and stand-in in the 2021 production of “A Thousand And One,” the directorial debut of A.V. Rockwell, who has recently gained industry acclaim because the film won the grand jury prize at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year. Among the countless people she was photographed celebrating the award with was Michael Latt and his mother, the founder of the festival.
Michael Latt and Rockwell took photos together tyhat night. Latt even posted a photo on Instagram with the caption, “Congratulations to @AVRockwell on your incredible feature film directorial debut, A Thousand and One.”
But by then, Rockwell had become the target of a stalker who had upset and frightened her so much with a series of disturbing emails and letters that she had been forced to get a restraining order against this person making her life miserable.
“The emotional distress has [led] to lack of sleep, inability to eat and concentrate,” Rockwell said in court documents. “Panic attacks caused by the anxiety and fear for my safety has meant that I have been unable to return to work. Her messages have disrupted my professional relationships.”
Rockwell’s stalker? Jameelah Elena Michl, the same movie extra from Rockwell’s directorial debut who had also worked as a stand-in for the film’s lead actress, Teyana Taylor.
“Every word you speak [is] directly from my soul.” Michl told Rockwell in one letter.
In another message, Michl blamed Rocwell’s rejection for driving her to her to threaten suicide.
“I know you would never tell me to go ahead and end it,” Michl wrote. “But your actions did a great job of speaking for you. You’ll be happy to know you will soon get your wish.”
Michl’s obsession appears to have begun after the the movie in which they worked together wrapped shooting. Michl inundated Rockwell with emails and messages — and even a gift box. When Rockwell didn’t respond, Michl sent hand-delivered distressing letters to the director’s home threatening self-harm.
“My Glock is loaded as I write this,” said one letter, according to the documents. “One pull of the trigger and I’ll be free.”
She also wrote Rockwell telling her that she had tracked down her mothers home address, escalating Rockwall’s fears.
“Jameelah used my mother’s social media account information to find her personal address, phone number, email address and known relatives and associates,” Rockwell wrote in court documents. “Jameelah described this in a letter to me.”
Last April, she began a seies of threats to turn her Glock on herself.
In another message, she told Rockwell that she had planned to kill herself at the Dolby Theater on Hollywood Boulevard.
Then she wrote saying she planned to kill herself on the stairs right before the Academy Awards.
“I had to choose between ending it right before Hollywood’s biggest night where I would surely get my message across to the entire world,” Michl wrote to Rockwell. “Or getting to see you one last time before I died… I chose you.”
Instead, on the Monday night after Thanksgiving, Michl decided to aim her Glock at the person she now concluded might be responsible for standing between her and Rockwell. Around 6 PM that evening, Michl showed up at Latt’s home, forced her way inside and shot and killed the man she apparently mistook as her romantic rival for Rockwell’s affection.
There is no indication of a romantic connection having existed between Rockwell and Latt. In his Instagram account, he had announced a recent engagement to his girlfriend, who was at the residence when he was shot.
According to Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. George Gascón, the suspected killer shot and killed Latt in his home for “being friends with a woman she had been stalking.”
Gascón, however, did not name the director as the stalking victim.
Latt was found shot around 6 p.m. last Monday night in his home on the 900 block of Alandele Avenue. He died at a local hospital a few hours later.
Michl was arrested at the scene as according to Los Angeles Police, who reported that the woman stood outside the residence and surrendered to officers.
The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office filed charges of murder and burglary with a firearm enhancement against Michl. She is being held on $3 million bail. Jail records showed that she did not have a criminal history.
Had Michl been stalking Latt, as she had Rockwell? Police believed she had been living out of her car. Latt’s neighbors reported having seen the car parked on the street, and police subsequently confiscated the car looking for evidence.
“A tragic act of violence,” Latt’s family called his murder in what may be the most charitable understatement to ever come out of Hollywood.
Neighbors said the victim and his fiancée were both home at the time of the attack.
“I’m heartbroken, I’m shocked.” Mid-Wilshire resident Avarie Shevin told KTLA. “He and his girlfriend lived there with a dog and a cat. He’s just very mellow. I can’t wrap my brain around what could’ve happened that caused him to be shot and killed.”
Shevin said she was in her home when she heard sirens and helicopters overhead. She opened her front door and was baffled to find police officers who told her to go back inside her house.
“I was looking out my window,” she said, “and saw a female standing in the walkway with her hands up and they took her into custody.”
Shevin said Latt’s mom had just arrived to take him to a movie.
“I said, ‘How is he? Is he going to be OK?’ and she said, ‘I don’t know if he’s going to make it,’ and my heart just stopped,” said Shevin.
Latt had just returned home from a trip to Japan, according to his social media.
His family also issued a statement, saying:
“Our beloved son, brother, grandson, fiancé, Michael Latt, fell victim to a tragic act of violence this week. Our family, Michael’s extraordinary friends and colleagues are shattered by the profound grief of losing our Michael.
“He devoted his career to supporting others, championing organizations that raised up women and artists of color, along with leveraging storytelling, art and various mediums to create enduring change and instill communities with hope, love and inspiration. Michael will never be forgotten, and we can all carry on his legacy of love, compassion and fierce dedication to positive and lasting change.”
Latt graduated from Chapman University in 2013 with a degree in public relations and advertising.
Soon after graduation, he did digital marketing on “Fruitvale Station,” the 2013 film that dramatized the killing of Oscar Grant at the hands of the police in Oakland. In a 2019 Forbes profile, Latt said that marked a turning point in his career.
“Working on Ryan Coogler’s ‘Fruitvale Station’ opened my eyes up to how prevalent and insidious White supremacy is in our country,” he said, “and also showed me the potent power of storytelling to change hearts and minds.”
Latt went on to market films like “The Birth of a Nation,” “If Beale Street Could Talk,” “I Am Not Your Negro” and “Crazy Rich Asians.” He also worked for Imagine Justice, a non-profit founded by Common, which advocates for prison reform.
In 2019 a Forbes magazine article titled, “Michael Latt Is Channeling Hollywood’s Appetite For Social Change,” described his work with films that detail the struggles of young Black men with law enforcement.
Latt was also a member of “Blackout for Human Rights,” a network of entertainment professionals and artists dedicated to fighting violence and empowering communities through art.
The charity helped organize events such as the 2017 “Hope & Redemption Tour” where the rapper Common performed concerts for inmates at more than 10 California prisons.
From 2016-2020, Latt helped organize the MLK Now events on Martin Luther King Jr. Day at Harlem’s Riverside Church that featured speakers such as Lupita Nyong’o, Ta-Nehisi Coates and Michael B. Jordan.
Latt talked about the importance of the prison tour in a 2019 interview with Forbes.
“Storytelling is imperative to creating lasting meaningful reform,” he said. “Through stories and art, we can showcase incarcerated and formerly incarcerated men and women’s humanity, shine a light on injustices in the system and shift the narrative about how we talk about the issues.
“In order to change public policy, we have to change public perception.”
