June 8, 2011 16:14

Ja Rule to begin two-year prison sentence today (June 8)

Rapper had pleaded guilty to gun charges

Photo: PA

Ja Rule is set to begin a two-year prison sentence today (June 8) on gun charges.

The rapper, born Jeffrey Atkins, pleaded guilty last December to attempted criminal possession of a weapon in connection with an arrest in July 2007. After that incident, the Manhattan District Attorney's office claimed police had found a loaded semi-automatic .40 caliber Taurus handgun, with the serial number scratched off, hidden in the backseat of his car.

Sources suggest that he will turn himself in today and begin his sentence in an Upstate New York correctional facility, according to MTV News.

Rule's arrest took place the same night that Lil Wayne was arrested on a gun charge which saw him imprisoned for eight months the same year. The two rappers had performed together in New York earlier that night.

Last month, Rule spoke of his remorse to MTV, and concern for his children, saying: "I'm disappointed. I'm mad at myself. My daughter, she’s 15 right now. These are her last couple of years. She's about to graduate from high school, and she’s going to college. She needs her father. My boys really need me right now too, as well as my wife. They need Daddy, and Daddy fucked up."

To add to his legal woes, Rule pleaded guilty in March for failing to pay more than $3 million in New Jersey taxes, and faces up to three years in prison in that case.