Eminem’s former bodyguard has revealed the rapper was almost the victim of a ‘hit’ on the orders of Death Row Records boss, Suge Knight.
To be fair, Knight is no stranger to ‘trouble’ – the co-founder and former CEO of the West Coast label is currently in prison after being charged with murder and attempted murder after a fatal hit-and-run in Compton, in 2015.
Eminem’s ex-minder Byron ‘Big Naz’ Williams recently appeared on The Murder Masta Show podcast and revealed details of Knight’s alleged attempt to get at his employer at the Source Awards in 2001, reports Hip Hop DX.
Big Naz said:
We all know historically in the past, at The Source Awards, someone always got shot.
Our first encounter with Suge Knight and his henchman – Em was going to his seat. The way they had the seating was all messed up and the bodyguards couldn’t sit with the artists.
He said he saw something kicking off in the middle of the aisle where Eminem was sitting:
He’s beefing with all these guys in these red shirts. Knight is affiliated with the Bloods.
I noticed Em’s face changing, he’s turning like tomato red. There’s a sea of red guys around him. I had to bust through the middle man and snatch him up.
This is exactly what they said: “Death Row, motherfucker, Death Row.”
Big Naz says he confronted the goons and learned that Knight had sent them specifically to stir it with Em.
“Man, Suge Knight sent us to strongarm him and it’s going down,” Naz remembers. I was like: “Oh man, I just inherited the East Coast – West Coast beef.”
Naz says he tried to take control of the situation – calling on the help of Dr. Dre:
I had to snatch him up, I had to call Dre and his bodyguards and tell them what was going on because they was backstage.
So long story short, we ended up going backstage, Eminem did his presentation and we had to watch out for guys backstage. I just had to be on knockout mode, man.
So it was me, Dre, Dre’s bodyguards, we were in beast mode the whole time.
Anybody that got anywhere close trying to get an autograph or trying to talk, they were gonna get laid out, man because that was the kind of atmosphere that was set up.
With Suge Knight’s reputation, you do not want to be on the wrong side of that guy…
