The mystery of the shooting that launched a coast-to-coast hip-hop feud may finally be over.
James Rosemond, also known as “Jimmy Henchman,” has reportedly admitted his involvement in a 1994 assault on Tupac Shakur that left the rapper shot, robbed and nearly dead at New York’s Quad Recording Studios. According to reporting in the Village Voice by Chuck Philips, Rosemond made the admission during proffer sessions last fall where his confession would not be used against him during an unaffiliated drug trafficking case involving millions of dollars of cocaine — an operation Rosemond was convicted of running in June.
Tupac accused Rosemond of responsibility for the crime in the song “Against All Odds,” recorded before his 1996 murder in Las Vegas. Per the Voice, court documents include a mention of the “defendant’s own admission about that particular shooting,” referring to the 1994 incident, though not containing the interview itself.
Philips has long investigated the murders of Shakur and fellow MC the Notorious B.I.G., and saw a 2008 expose on the matter retracted by the Los Angeles Times after certain FBI reports cited in the piece were revealed to be fakes.
In 2011, Dexter Isaac cited Rosemond as the ring-leader of the 1994 shooting, telling AllHipHop.com in a statement, “James Rosemond hired me to rob 2Pac at the Quad Studio.”
No one will be tried in the crime: its New York statue of limitations expired over a decade ago. Rosemond faces life in jail over his recent drug case; he was also indicted on a murder-for-hire charge on Friday. Isaac is serving a life sentence for an unrelated robbery and killing. –Billboard