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You may not know who Erik "Shake" James

is. But you are about to meet him. As a personal friend of the late, great,

Jam Master Jay, Shake was part of Jay’s inner circle from 1988 until the Jam

Master’s murder in October of

2002.

Shake traveled around the globe with Jam Master

Jay and actually introduced AllHipHop’s owners/founders to the legendary DJ.

When the rumors of Jay’s death started to circulate,

AllHipHop’s Grouchy Greg paged Jam Master hoping he would dispel what had yet

to be confirmed, only to receive the tragic confirmation from Jay’s pager, but

with Shake responding.

After hearing Randy Allen’s interview

on Hot 97, in which he seemingly told an alternate version of what happened

the night Jay was murdered, Shake decided to speak his mind.

Allen and his sister Lydia High, were longtime

associates of Jay. Both have recently been under scrutiny from various media

outlets, the subject of various reports suggesting they may know more about

the murder than they are revealing.

In this exclusive interview, Shake comes forward

to speak about the man he called his best friend, Jam Master Jay, and what may

have happened to him.

AllHipHop: What was your role with Jay?

Shake: That was my best friend man.

Allhiphop: You also worked with Run-DMC?

S: Yeah

Allhiphop: Jay was with you the day before he

was murdered, no strange behavior?

S: We just played video games and was just hanging

man.

Allhiphop: The following day he went back to

the studio and was killed. Who was in the studio that night?

S: He had told me that he had to get back home

because he had to turn in the Rusty Waters album. He bounced and I was speaking

to him off and on. We had went to the club that night and he left his 2way in

there. I went out the club and grabbed his 2way for him. He told me to grab

50 Cent’s 2way out the pager cause he wanted to speak to him about this movie

thing. I spoke to Jay when they were getting their hair cuts and he told me

to not call his cell phone and to call him at the studio, cause that’s where

he was going to finish up the album. I gave him the number that he needed. He

went into the studio. Next thing I know, may man calls me up and tells me that

terrible news.

Allhiphop: Who were the people that were in the

studio that night?

S: First of all, I wouldn’t be doing this but

I heard Randy on Hot 97 today (June 25). The story that he told on the radio,

he told me a totally different story as to what happened. He told me that they

met this chick and she wanted someone to listen to her demo. Randy said that

him and Mike B. (Michael Bonds) Jay, Tone (Urieco "Pretty Tone" Rincon),

Lydia and the chick whose demo they were listening to were there. Somebody knocked

on the door, told Lydia to get down, popped Jay and Pretty Tone gets hit off

the ricochet. Randy said that he sees Jay down, grabs the studio gun and chases

the gunman. He runs out the back, Mike B runs out the front. They chasing the

dude and they can’t find them. I’m like why didn’t you shoot? He said that dude

was gone. My whole thing is this. All these dudes say they love Jay, say they’d

do this and that. All these people owe Jay more than what they doing. To just

sit back and say nothing and everybody is telling a different story. It ain’t

like Jay got killed by a sniper from a million yards away, it was people right

there. Then I hear him say there was 60 people in the hall? So now that’s 65

witnesses and nobody still saw nothing? Dude sat right in a car, looked me dead

in my face. I said, "Randy, it’s just me and you. Who did that to Jay?"

He said "Shake the n*gga that killed your best friend and mine is Curtis

Scoon." And then he told me that bullsh*t ass story. But then on the radio

today he sounded like he was protecting Scoon! I’m already sitting back f*cked

up about this sh*t everyday and now I have to figure why the f*ck Randy lied

to me.

AllHipHop: So one minute he’s telling you Scoon

did it, and now he’s saying it might not have been Scoon.

S: What’s real is real. He sounded like he was

protecting dude. He said that their beef wasn’t big enough for him to wanna

kill Jay.

AllHipHop: OK so what do you think about Scoon?

S: Man, their beef is so old, it was a money

thing. That sh*t was in 1993. That sh*t is old but you can’t just rule sh*t

out.

AllHipHop: Why do you think Randy Allen and Lydia

may not be cooperating with the police?

S: I’ma tell you like this. n*ggas always

talk about that street code. As far as that goes, that’s out the window. This

is Jay. They supposed to be family. Jay would take his shirt off his back and

give it to them dudes. I’m not saying they wouldn’t do it too, but they not

right now. When you in the streets and your grindin’ and hustling and somebody

get done like that, it’s a part of the game cause you living that life. When

you not doing that and

your on the right path, that’s not supposed to happen. That was cold blooded

murder.

AllHipHop: A lot of things have been printed

about Randy Allen and the authorities are now investigating him. Has there been

anything different about his behavior?

S: Everybody needs to just get on the same page

and focus on who really did this to Jay. To me, they didn’t give a f*ck about

Jason Mizzell, but they loved Jam Master Jay. I know they don’t care about his

kids or his wife. It’s so scary cause some of these cats poppin up were never

part of our circle. All of a sudden these dudes are hanging close to DMC, I

see these dudes trying to run up on Terri. These cats were never around. And

they know

who I am talking about.

AllHipHop: There was a report

in Newsday that said investigators were looking into whether or not Terri was

linked to Supreme. Investigators said they dismissed that. Can you comment on

that?

S: As far as that situation goes, that don’t

got nothing to do with what’s going on. Everyone’s focus should be to find out

who killed Jay. All that other stuff is extra.

AllHipHop: What could have been the motive behind

anyone wanting to kill Jay? Are you aware of any street beef’s Jay may have

had?

S: I wish I was aware, because I would have known

who did it. From 88- until Oct. 30th I spent the best years of my life with

Run, D, Terri, Jay. I been around the world with them cats man. I was Robin,

he was Batman, put it like that.