The notorious Bronx jail that housed Tupac Shakur, DMX and Lil Wayne
Bearing a terrible reputation for violence, and described by one American politician as “a symbol of brutality and inhumanity,” Rikers Island is home to one of the biggest, most intimidating jail complexes on Earth. Situated in the East River of New York, and considered to be a part of the Bronx, Rikers has housed some notable people through the years—including several of hip-hop’s most significant figures.
Harvey Weinstein, Sid Vicious and Mark David Chapman, the man who murdered John Lennon, have all, at one point or another, been held on Rikers Island, but, in terms of rap stars, few figures are as significant as Tupac Shakur. He was incarcerated on Rikers for sexual assault in the mid-’90s.
Tupac and two others were charged with sodomising a woman in a New York hotel room in November 1993, although he was acquitted of three counts of sodomy a year later in December 1994. He was ultimately convicted on two counts of first-degree sexual abuse for “forcibly touching the woman’s buttocks.”
Tupac, unable to post bail and still recovering from injuries sustained in a shooting in late 1994, was first held in a jail ward in a New York hospital, before he was moved to Rikers Island in January 1995. He remained there until March, before being moved to another facility.
A decade later, DMX found himself locked up on Rikers Island like Tupac before him. X had violated the terms of his parole, so, in November 2005, he was sentenced to serve 70 days on Rikers. He was released early for good behaviour, walking free in time for New Year’s Eve.
In 2006, an as-yet-unknown young man who later became famous as A$AP Rocky was sent to Rikers after he’d become embroiled in a brawl. He was still only a teenager at the time, and, while he only spent two weeks imprisoned, he has since spoken about how the experience altered his outlook on life forever.
Four years later, in 2010, Lil Wayne was sent to Rikers for a year after he pleaded guilty to possessing a firearm. He was initially held in isolation from the rest of the inmate population, given his extreme level of fame. He was allowed to leave for good behaviour after eight months.
These locked-up rappers only scratch at the surface of the Rikers Island inmate population. Thousands of people are held there at any one time, and each of them is subsequently exposed to a threat of violence. Rikers Island’s reputation for abuse and killings is notorious.
The jail complex is so controversial, in fact, that in 2019 the New York City Council voted to close it down. Corey Johnson, the speaker of the council at the time, characterised it as “a symbol of brutality and inhumanity” and insisted that it must be closed.
“As a city,” he said, “we must do everything we can to move away from the failed policies of mass incarceration.” The initial plan had been to close down the complex by the end of 2026, but that deadline has since been extended.