Less than a week after he was shot in front of Hot 97 FM’s SoHo studios in New York, rapper Gravy is addressing the incident that briefly sent him to the hospital.
According to reports, Gravy was shot in the buttocks last Wednesday (April 26) by a man who was upset when the rapper refused to let him sit in on a radio interview.
"We went up [to Hot 97] forty-six deep, promoting, like you’re supposed to do," said the rapper (born Jamal Woolward), who arrived early for an interview with on-air personality Funkmaster Flex. "He wasn’t ready yet, but when he got there, he said to come back at ten or eleven [p.m.] I went downstairs to grab a bite to eat."
It was not until Gravy returned that shots rang out, the rapper said. "I started running like anyone else would do because I didn’t know where they was coming. Once I got hit, I fell, got back up and went inside the building," he said. "I didn’t think I was hit. I thought I tripped over something and bruised myself."
Gravy described the shot as feeling "like heat and warm sensation. "It was a clean shot. It went straight through and just missed my pelvis bone and my stomach area to make me have a s— bag," said Gravy.
"It’s all about luck, it was eleven rounds and I only took one hit."
Despite being wounded, Gravy conducted the interview and was later treated and released from St. Vincent’s Hospital in Manhattan.
"I’m up there not telling them [Hot 97, Funkmaster Flex] what’s going on. I sat there for about two hours and they didn’t know what was going on. I hid it [being shot] very well," he said. "I didn’t risk my life. I just didn’t know how serious the hit was."
Police are continuing to investigate the incident. NYPD Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said that Gravy has yet to aid them in apprehending the shooter.
"I wasn’t trying to involve Hot [97] or the streets to make it look like he’s trying to come up," the rapper told AllHipHop.com.
"Something went down, it got ugly and that’s my business, nobody else’s.
"I am not being uncooperative, I don’t know who did it," Gravy continued. "I just know one thing.—I got a lotta haters. I ain’t gotta speak too much because n***as promote me on other n***a’s DVD. Someone is always doing a DVD dissin’ me…I just know one thing. The only way to stop me from shining is to kill me."
The shooting, in addition to recent violence at Hot 97, have resulted in plans by the New York Police Department to install a surveillance camera outside the building that houses the radio station.
The camera, which will carry the NYPD logo and go up this week, is part of a $9 million plan to place 500 video recorders throughout the city.
The Hot 97 camera will be on 24 hours a day and pointed directly at the station’s location at 395 Hudson St. It will specifically focus on preventing rap-related gunplay, unlike most cameras that will target high-crime areas and potential terror targets.
"We’ll keep it in place until Hot 97 is evicted or cleans up its act,"
a source told New York’s Daily News.
Although the shooting was not captured by nearby surveillance cameras, cameras did record people running from the gunfire, according to sources. Police have since stepped up security with the addition of extra officers stationed outside the studio and a marked patrol car at night.
NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly announced the department’s intent to put up the cameras last month. There are currently two wireless video recorders installed at high-crime areas in Brooklyn, the Daily News reports. Sources tell the paper that the Hot 97 camera will be the first to go up in Manhattan.
The recent violence has also prompted the New York City District Council of Carpenters, which owns the building that houses Hot 97 studios, to vow to evict the station. The move has received support from several of the building’s tenants.
A spokesman for the union’s attorney Brian O’Dwyer told the Daily News Sunday (April 30) that "lawyers will be meeting with their clients [today] and examining all their options."
"They shouldn’t be blamed for an action they had nothing to do with," Gravy said. "This is Hip-Hop. This comes with the game. It happens everday in the hood."
A spokesman for Hot 97 was not available for comment.
