A man identifying himself as a former friend of Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling told CNN host Don Lemon on Wednesday that he arranged for Sterling to meet escorts on several occasions, but was responsible for releasing excerpts from a conversation with Sterling to several outlets.
"I called him -- and that piece of the tape's not out -- but he just started going crazy, just started going off," the guest, who identified himself as Maseratimet, told Lemon. "So I said, 'this guy just took it overboard.' So I just hit record. That was just something I wanted to capture and let people really hear the other side of Donald Sterling."
Maseratimet told Lemon that he met Sterling "five or six" years ago through a mutual friend, but Lemon managed to get him to admit that he procured escorts for the Clippers owner through a service he ran in Las Vegas at the time. Lemon identified him on Wednesday as an "aspiring rapper."
"He liked them light-skinned, I ain't gonna lie," Maseratimet explained. "He preferred light-skinned women [of color]."
However, Maseratimet did note that he was not responsible for releasing the conversation between Sterling and girlfriend V. Stiviano that precipitated the wave of outrage against him. The controversy earned Sterling scorn from not only the general public, but NBA players and his team's sponsors before he was banned for life from the league late last month.
"You taped yourself having a conversation with someone you called a friend -- and, I guess, sort of a business acquaintance from the past," Lemon told Maseratimet. "Someone who is going through a crisis of his own making, and you made them public. Do you have any qualms about that? Do you feel any guilt?"
"No, I don't feel any guilt," Maseratimet replied. "When he apologized, I didn't take his apology serious. He said he was just trying to have sex with her. In that case, you went a little bit too far to [say] that much. You didn't have to say that much to just get the girl to lay down. She's the type of female who it don't take that much to have sex with."
Maseratimet also admitted to Lemon that Sterling did not know he was being recorded at the time. Unlike federal law, California law requires consent of all parties involved before a call may be recorded.
"You don't feel you set him up?" Lemon asked.
"I don't feel I set him up. I really don't." Maseratimet replied. "When I first called him, it wasn't recorded. And when he started drilling me, I hit the record button. I didn't care at the time. This guy, he said some stuff that I got offended to, and then he talked about Magic Johnson? I look up to Magic Johnson, so it just really ticked me off."
Watch the interview, as posted online on Wednesday, below.
