Actor Nicholas Cage buys rights to play NYPD detective

Actor Nicholas Cage has purchased the rights to play an NYPD detective in a film based on the book "Circle of Six," which delves into the still officially unsolved murder of a city police officer inside a Harlem mosque in 1972.

Photo: Actor Nicholas Cage buys rights to play NYPD detective

Cage, who recently played a Port Authority sergeant in 2006's "World Trade Center" and is appearing in the soon-to-be-released film adaptation of the comic book "Ghost Rider", also bought the rights to shop around "Circle of Six," the New York Post reported in its Wednesday edition.

Retired Detective Randy Jurgensen and Robert Cea co-wrote "Circle of Six," published in 2006. Jurgensen was one of the investigators who looked into the murder of Police Officer Philip Cardillo on April 14, 1972. Cardillo was killed in a Harlem mosque that at that time was led by the Nation of Islam's Louis Farrakhan, reports AP.

In "Circle of Six," the authors allege that city and racial politics of the day hampered the investigation, even though Jurgensen argues in the book that he captured Cardillo's killer.