New transcripts of a grand jury hearing from earlier this year now implicate Marion “Suge” Knight in yet another embroilment of controversy as he is accused of sending several threatening messages toward F. Gary Gray, director of Straight Outta Compton.
New details from the hearing back in February were made public on Friday, showing that Suge Knight made several phone calls to Gray after being displeased with the portrayal of his person in the NWA biopic, and being angry at the fact that he was not being compensated. When Gray did not bite, he received a menacing text form Knight, whose violent past precedes him.
“I will see u in person … u have kids just like me so let’s play hardball,” the message read, followed by what the Los Angeles Times describes as a “pair of expletive and a racial slur.”
According to new details, these threats left Gray so shaken that he failed to accurately respond to questions surrounding the incident while on the stand in February’s hearing.
“He’s so afraid he came in here and lied under oath,” Deputy District Attorney Cynthia Barned told the grand jury. “He’s perjuring himself because he’s that afraid.”
The result of this hearing was the later indictment of Suge on charges of threatening F. Gary Gray and inciting bodily injury. Kinght’s attorney, Dominique Banos, maintains that the texts in question use language that would come from law enforcement and that they did not originate from her client with the texts, sent on August 8, 2014, reading out, “I’m from Bompton. …I’m a Blood criminal street gang member from the city of Compton … Time has arrived Faith in God keep ppl safe. The Devil’s Money can’t save No 1.”
“It was basically just feeding the grand jury what it needed to be fed in order to get an indictment,” Barnes said in reference to police officers’ testimonies.
It was in January of 2015 that things took a very violent turn when Suge Knight rammed his Ford pickup truck into two men outside of a burger joint in Compton after a dispute on the set of Straight Outta Compton. The incident resulted in the death of 55-year old Terry Carter.
Knight now awaits trial on this homicide case, the Gray case, and a seperate robbery case.