Locals object to naming street after Notorious BIG because of his criminal past

Residents in Brooklyn's Clinton Hill neighborhood are concerned the rapper is not a good role model

Residents of Brooklyn’s Clinton Hill neighborhood in new York have objected to a petition set up to get a street corner named after Notorious BIG.

Earlier this year, fans started the campaign to have the hip-hop star’s childhood street corner of St James Place & Fulton Street renamed as Christopher Wallace Way (his real name).

Discussing the proposal this week, the local community board were unimpressed by the idea, according to DNAinfo New York.

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One board member Lucy Koteen said she had researched the rapper’s history and found that: “He started selling drugs at 12, he was a school dropout at 17, he was arrested for drugs and weapons charge, he was arrested for parole violations, he was arrested in North Carolina for crack cocaine, in 1996 he was again arrested for assault, he had a violent death and physically the man is not exactly a role model for youth. I don’t see how this guy was a role model and frankly it offends me.”

After the meeting, LeRoy McCarthy, the man behind the petition, said: “There are many artists that share stories in a vernacular that their audiences understand. Biggie used the language from the streets he grew up in to convey what he wanted to say.”

To have the street corner renamed, Councilwoman Letitia James will need to write a letter in support of the proposal. She is yet to comment on the idea.

Wallace was murdered in a drive-by shooting in Los Angeles on March 9, 1997. He was shot four times whilst sat in the passenger seat of a Chevy Suburban on Wilshire Blvd. In December last year, the Los Angeles Police Department apologised after releasing his autopsy report without informing the rapper’s family.

In the years since his death, there has been speculation that the murder was an act of revenge for the death of Tupac Shakur, who was killed six months earlier in Las Vegas. His murder case has also never been solved.

Wallace was born on May 21, 1972 and grew up in Brooklyn. He released his debut album ‘Ready To Die’ in 1994 after coming to the attention of Sean Combs, aka P Diddy, and married singer Faith Evans in 1995.

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