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Doctors tried to save Pop Smoke's life by opening his chest after he was rushed to the hospital with multiple gunshot wounds.

Pop Smoke's death certificate, obtained by TMZ, says doctors performed a thoracotomy on the left side of his chest -- meaning they opened his chest, most likely attempting to remove bullets. As we first reported, he was hit multiple times when masked assailants broke into the Hollywood Hills home where he was staying.

Pop Smoke's cause of death was a gunshot wound to the torso, according to the document. It says the time between the shooting and his death was "rapid."

The rapper -- born Bashar Barakah Jackson -- died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center at 5:12 AM.

The document also reveals his body was transported back to his native Brooklyn. Pop Smoke's family held a private ceremony last weekend for close friends and family.

District Attorney Jackie Lacey's husband was not a happy camper when protesters showed up on their doorstep -- wielding a gun and threatening to shoot if they didn't scram.

The Los Angeles County D.A.'s hubby was pissed off Monday morning, and aimed what appears to be a handgun at Black Lives Matter organizer Melina Abdullah. He angrily ordered her and whoever else was outside to get off their Granada Hills property ... or he'd fire.

Abdullah kept her cool during the confrontation, asking Lacey's husband, David, if Jackie could come to the door -- or if he could relay the BLM camp was there to see her.

He wasn't having any of that, though, telling her he didn't care who she was or what org. she was with ... once again demanding they scram before slamming the door shut. Apparently, Lacey had agreed to meet with BLM L.A. that morning ... but didn't show up.

It appears BLM went to Lacey's crib to protest in an effort to coax her out. Abdullah says she was simply there to "invite" Lacey, almost as a reminder that she'd agreed to meet with them. That said ... it's unclear what more, if anything, led up to this moment.

Law enforcement sources tell us the LAPD is aware of the video and spoke with the person the gun was aimed at (Abdullah, in this case). We're told she refused to cooperate, and for now ... the department is investigating the circumstances further. No arrests were made.

Steven Spielberg's daughter was arrested in Tennessee this weekend after an altercation with her boyfriend -- and it all started because he said something rude to her ... so say cops.

Mikaela Spielberg got busted Saturday night in Nashville, after returning home with her BF from a bar. Cops were called after an apparent argument erupted between them after the dude said something "rude" to her, which allegedly resulted in Mikaela hurling objects at him ... one of which struck him in the hand and left damage.

The responding officers saw a visible injury on the BF which looked fresh -- they say there was dry blood on his hand and that his wrist looked swollen. The police say both parties admitted to a physical dispute but determined Mikaela was the aggressor.

One of the reasons they ended up booking her on domestic assault charges is because cops say her story on what exactly happened constantly changed, while cops say the BF's story remained consistent. They make a point to say the guy didn't want Mikaela prosecuted, but the officers say their department is still moving forward.

Mikaela was booked and held on $1,000 bond, and has since been released.

Of course, the arrest comes shortly after news broke that Mikaela's forging a solo career in porn.

Public Enemy is moving forward without one of its original (and more memorable) founders -- the one and only Flavor Flav is out ... this after a big argument over a Bernie Sanders rally.

The legendary hip-hop group permanently fired their longtime member Sunday night, saying ... "Public Enemy and Public Enemy Radio will be moving forward without Flavor Flav." They continued, "We thank him for his years of service and wish him well."

The ax comes after Flav fired off a cease-and-desist letter to the Sanders campaign last week, accusing them of using FF's image and likeness in a scheduled performance Chuck D and the rest of the guys had planned to put on in support of Bernie out here in L.A.

The writing was clearly on the wall from the get-go -- Bernie and co. announced they were having Public Enemy Radio perform at their rally ... which confused some folks.

That group is an off-shoot of the OG Public Enemy, and they do shows without Flav, which they've apparently been doing for a little while on and off. Fact is ... Flav and Chuck haven't been cool for years -- ever since FF sued the group over profits he claimed he was owed.

As for this final salvo ... Chuck went on Twitter and wrote, "last final note the last final note was my last straw was long ago. It’s not about BERNIE with Flav... he don’t know the difference between BarrySanders or BernieSanders he don’t know either."

No love lost between old friends, it seems.

If you could change anything about yourself, what would it be?!

NFL prospect Trey Adams says he wants a "bigger d**k!"

And, why do we know that?! Because the former Washington Huskies lineman said it ON CAMERA at the NFL Combine!!

The 6'8", 327-pound offensive tackle was doing the usual Q&A stuff with Combine staffers (not a specific team) when he got the layup question ... and thought he'd give a jokey answer.

Of course, these Q&A sessions are SUPPOSED to remain private, but someone leaked the footage ... and yeah, it's super-viral now!

Ya gotta wonder if Trey's stupid answer will affect his draft stock -- would you hire a guy who made a penis joke in his job interview?

Not everyone is laughing about the situation ... especially former NFL exec (and current NFL analyst) Gil Brandt who's pretty furious about the fact the footage was leaked in the first place.

"I hope the person who leaked the Trey Adams video is found out and punished to the fullest extent," Brandt said.

"These are supposed to be confidential meetings. Not fair to Adams or the process. Both players and teams rely on this confidentiality to have honest discussions.”

Come for Sen. Bernie Sanders, stay for Dick Van Dyke's awesome vamping ... which includes a serious strut the Bernie Bros will probably be adopting.

The film and TV legend was called to duty ... doing some intros Sunday night at Bernie's rally at the L.A. Convention Center -- and when it came time to stall for the candidate ... Dick delivered!!! Several times he busted out his moves on stage ... remember, dude is 94 years old.

Dick even serenaded the crowd with a tune -- sounds like an original -- about missing Bernie. Hell, he was so entertaining the Bernie supporters broke out the "We want Dick" chants.

The man of the hour eventually made it on stage, a couple of speakers after DVD ... but before that it was all about the Hollywood icon.

Nate Dogg's new headstone is a masterpiece ... no better way to pay homage to a legend.

The late rapper's new headstone was unveiled over the weekend at Forest Lawn in Long Beach, his hometown. Fans, family and friends of Nate came out to show their love ... including Nate's brother, Sam, and the LBC's own Daz Dillinger.

The new tombstone honors Nate's legacy ... from his music career and love for Long Beach to honoring his time in the United States Marine Corps. He enlisted after high school.

Nate Dogg was also universally respected as a brilliant collaborator. The "King of Hooks" also had lyrics from his "Music and Me" track emblazoned on the headstone, which also pays homage to his G-Funk Classics.

TMZ broke the story ... the same guy who gave Eazy-E's final resting place a face-lift put in some serious work on Nate Dogg's headstone. This had been in the works since last September after Nate Dogg's family hit up Cemetery Tim to spruce up Dogg's plot with a new headstone.

Dana White hates the idea of a costume party before a big fight -- which is why he won't allow UFC fighters to play dress-up like Deontay Wilder did at the Tyson Fury fight.

The UFC honcho thinks Deontay's decision to rock a 45-pound costume during his ring walk was ill-informed ... but says ya can't blame the whole loss on the outfit -- give credit to Fury!

"I think there's a lot to it. Fury looked awesome," White says ... "Fury fought a perfect fight. But, if you think about boxing and fights when fighters are getting ready, they're in the back. They're relaxing. Some guys sleep. Some guys just lay around and chill. Then you get up, you time it out, do your warm-up. Then you throw something on to stay warm. You don't put all this gear on and all this stuff. That's why I don't do any of that bulls**t in the UFC. I don't like it. I don't like any of that."

But, is the costume the reason Wilder lost? No.

"The reason he lost is 'cause Fury is a bad-ass boxer, and he fought the perfect fight that night and executed his game plan."

As for Fury, who has previously teased a possible MMA fight at some point in his career -- White says, "I'm interested in the future of Tyson Fury in all combat sports!"

"I'm excited to see him no matter where he goes. If he wants to fight in the UFC, I would love it. I'm excited to see what's next for him in boxing."

Marilyn Monroe's time behind-the-scenes of the 1953 film, "Niagara," was captured by a photographer, and his huge set of photographic negatives is up for grabs ... but it won't come cheap.

The pics -- 227 total, 198 of which depict Marilyn -- were snapped by Canadian journalist and photog Jock Carroll in 1952, while she was preparing for her first top billing as Rose Loomis in the noir thriller.

The set of photos is mostly comprised of black-and-white negatives but includes some color positive transparencies. And, along with shots of Monroe, there are several of the sets, scenery and of course ... Niagara Falls.

The negatives could become much more than just a collector's item too ... because they include the copyright to the images. Carroll signed the rights over to his son before he died, and the son will grant them to the buyer.

This means the highest bidder at the auction will have the right to print and even sell copies from the negatives, which could lead to big bucks. Commercial use requires permission from Monroe's estate, however.

"Mad" Mike Hughes may have blacked out and that's why he failed to deploy backup parachutes moments before his fatal rocket crash ... TMZ has learned.

Mike's rep, Darren Shuster, tells TMZ ... the daredevil's launch got off to a terrible start when his parachute got snagged by a ladder next to the rocket. Mike needed a ladder because he didn't wanna be lifted into it, as they had initially prepared.

When the parachute got snagged, Mike's ground control crew radioed Mike and ordered him to deploy his backup parachute. There were 2 backups on the rocket. Problem was ... the ground crew never got a response from Mike.

Shuster tells us Mike's crew believes he may have blacked out with the rocket taking off at around 500 MPH. Shuster believes if Mike blacked out, it could very well explain why he never deployed his backup chute.

The timing for deploying the backup chutes was also critical ... Mike would have had to deploy the backup before he hit his apex because if he was descending at too high of a speed, it would have ripped a hole in the chute. But, Mike never got the chance.

As we reported ... the amateur rocket-engineer launched himself in the air with a self-made rocket that crash-landed. The incident was captured on camera after it was highly publicized.

Mike was attempting to get as close to space from Earth as possible -- known as the Karman line, about 62 miles above Earth's surface without the use of advanced tech.

This little lady in red was born in Jerusalem but moved to the U.S at a young age ... where she flourished in school, studied ballet and learned several different languages.

When she was 10, a Revlon agent spotted her at a pizza restaurant and asked her to become a child model. She declined but used it as an opportunity to start her acting career.

Her first gig was as one of the understudies for the lead role in the off-Broadway musical, "Ruthless!" ... along with Britney Spears, who she remains friends with to this day.

After that -- at the age of 12 -- she landed her first big onscreen role as the young protegee of a hitman in a 1994 action-drama ... and business was boomin' from there.

She'd go on to star in some of the most popular movie franchises of all time, along with rom-coms and more ... and won an Oscar for Best Actress in 2011 for a film that linked back to her ballet days.

'90 Day Fiance' star Alex Brovarnik leaped into action and became a real-life superhero while vacationing with his wife, Loren, in the Bahamas ... saving a man from drowning.

The former reality TV star -- whose journey from Israel to the States was documented during season 3 of the show -- was out in Nassau over the weekend when he spotted a clearly intoxicated young man make his way out to the water and begin to go under.

What happened next was nothing short of incredible ... he literally pulled the guy's limp body back to shore and began trying to help him regain consciousness as a crowd formed. In video of the heroic moment, you can hear the cameraman cheer him on. Rightly so!

Loren wrote of the situation, "My husband was watching a guy who was beyond intoxicated, who was with his 'friends' who just stood there and watched! The man went into the water and about drowned!"

She continued, "We are meant to be in a place in time for a reason! Alex and his friend Sean were meant to be at this beach, at this exact time because if not, who knows what could have happened!" Sounds like the dude eventually came to -- Loren says his life was saved.

Loren and Alex are one of the few success stories from the show. They're married, obviously, and are currently expecting their first child together. Alex also finally got his citizenship all these years later.

Megan Thee Stallion says a simple request to renegotiate her contract turned into a stalemate that's keeping a lid on any new tunes.

The rapper took to IG Live Sunday to call her out her record label, 1501, claiming they're not allowing to drop any new music for the time being -- all because, as she claims, MTS asked them to tweak some fine print in the deal she's signed with them at a young age.

Megan says she signed with 1501 when she was about 20 years old, and there were a lot things in her contract with them she simply wasn't aware of -- that is, until she started getting managed by Jay-Z's Roc Nation, which pointed a lot of stuff out to her.

Long story short, Meg says everything was all good and dandy until one day she approached the label and asked to renegotiate ... at which point, she says things went "left."

Megan claims as a result of her asking ... the label has put her and any new tunes on ice. She likens the move to nothing more than greed in its purest form -- and it's clear, there's beef.

Interestingly enough, we actually spoke to the co-founder of Meg's label, ex-MLB player Carl Crawford, and he told us he basically discovered Meg and helped put her on. Didn't sound like there was much friction between her and them at the time -- seems things have changed.

The bad news is for fans, of course -- 'cause if what she's saying is true, it can mean a whole year without some 'Hot Girl' seasons to bless us. Shame ...

Pete Buttigieg is throwing in the towel in his bid for the presidency -- he's reportedly set to suspend his campaign ahead of Super Tuesday.

According to reports, the former South Bend mayor is dropping out after performing poorly on Saturday during the South Carolina primary ... where he came in at a distant fourth, only racking up about 8% of the vote which was largely made up of African-Americans.

Pete won the Iowa Caucus by a thin margin, but has largely underperformed in the races after that. So far, he's got 26 delegates to his name -- while Biden now has 53 and Bernie Sanders (the proverbial so-called front-runner) has amassed 60 to himself.

Elizabeth Warren has just 8 delegates, and Amy Klobuchar has only 7 -- no signs yet of either of them cutting bait ... it's interesting PB called uncle first, seeing how the big contest was around the corner. On Tuesday, a whopping 1,357 pledged delegates are up for grabs.

The Democratic nominee needs only 1,991 of those pledged delegates to claim victory.

Part of the problem for Pete thus far has been his inability to win over black voters, or voters of color in general. He made lots of efforts to do so, but in the end ... they just weren't with him. Of course, he was also battling homophobia within the party as well.

Pete was the first openly gay major presidential candidate to make a run at the White House. There've been others before him, but he was the first with a legitimate shot. He was also the youngest candidate in the race -- coming in 38 years old, while everyone else remaining is well over 50 and beyond.

Buttigieg was becoming a favorite among moderate voters in the Democratic Party -- being seen as a more stable option than someone like Sanders. Biden fits that bill too though ... it'll be interesting to see if he picks up Pete as a running mate in the weeks to come.

Michael Bloomberg's controversial past with minorities and people of color isn't going away -- that much is clear by the striking protest he received during an event in Selma.

The billionaire media mogul and ex-NYC Mayor was among the many Democratic candidates in Alabama this weekend to commemorate the 55th anniversary of Bloody Sunday -- when hundreds of civil rights marchers were brutally beaten by cops during a demonstration.

At this particular service at the Brown Chapel AME Church -- where Bloomberg and Joe Biden delivered remarks -- a handful of people stood up and turned their backs when Mike stepped to the podium. It was done in silence, and they sat down when he finished.

The pastor who intro'd him, Reverend Leodis Strong, said he thought it was important for MB to show and to speak ... and for people to hear him out on how he's changed. Clearly, not everyone felt that way.

Of course, Bloomberg has come under fire for old comments he made about the policy he adopted when he was in power -- namely, unchecked and blatantly racist implementation of stop-and-frisk by the NYPD. At first, Bloomberg said it was effective to deter crime.

Later, he scaled it back and eventually apologized for his words. Apparently, some folks aren't accepting his apology. It should be noted, more people didn't protest than those who did.

Bloomberg's looking to rake in delegates for the first time on Tuesday -- when several states will hold primaries and offer up a third of the needed share to claim victory.

Justin Bieber turned 26 this weekend -- and as much as you might think the guy had every reason to cut loose ... he kinda did the exact opposite when it was time to make a wish.

The Biebs' party went down Saturday night at Delilah in L.A. -- this after a reported 1-on-1 romantic dinner with the missus, Hailey -- where a bunch of their pals came out to help him celebrate the big 2-6. It looked like a sweet shindig -- there was a live band, drinks being passed around and, of course, lots of pastry sweets ... including candle-lit cupcakes.

He had a cake to himself though, and as everybody sang him "Happy Birthday," Justin looked a little ... dare we say, somber? Yes, some of that -- but mostly content and chillaxed.

He had Hailey right in front of him, naturally, and it appears he kept his eyes mostly on her the whole time. Clearly, the married couple is head over heels to this day. He was later seen cradling her from behind, and they snuck in some smooches where they could.

Even with a ton of cameras on them, they didn't seem to care. Justin and Hailey just couldn't keep their hands off each other as they hugged, kissed, swayed and canoodled. Young love at its finest, right?

Now, just to be clear ... it wasn't all lovey-dovey and heart eyes all night -- JB DID get down and bust a move at different points in the party. He also got on the mic for a bit, but for the most part ... Bieber seemed to be acting pretty freaking responsible and playing the good hubby all night.