Source: Tim Heitman / Getty
Retired NBA player Stephen Jackson called out Kanye West for the public allegation that George Floyd died from a drug overdose instead of an officer’s knee on his neck. Jackson, who also hosts the podcast All The Smoke with Matt Barnes, appeared to have also made some thinly veiled shots at the Drink Champs podcast, too.
“Don’t talk to opportunists ’cause that’s what you’re doing,” Jackson said in the first of two Instagram posts on Sunday. “Because the same time [that] all this George Floyd sh-t was going on, everybody was screaming ‘George Floyd this, George Floyd that.’ Because everybody was trying to make money off of somebody else’s pain. But that ain’t the hustle no more.”
“The new hustle is talking about him and dissing him,” he added. “All that sh-t is weak. All of y’all [are] clout chasing. All of y’all look sad.”
Jackson was longtime friends with Floyd, having become familiar with each other during their shared childhoods in Houston, TX. The former pro baller even often referred to Floyd as “Twin” due to their uncanny resemblances.
“I can’t wait to see who [else] jumps on the bandwagon and who gets to posting sh*t and tryna clout chase, too,” Jackson warned in his second post, promising it would be the last time he spoke on the matter. “’Cause I got receipts. I’ve got text messages from all you muthaf-ckas! I’ve got calls from all you muthaf-ckas! Jack this, How can I help, get on the side of you, when’s the next press conference you doin’? But don’t do that, y’all better not do that!”
https://twitter.com/Kurrco/status/1581518506923036673?s=20
“They hit him with the fentanyl, if you look the guy’s knee wasn’t even on his neck like that,” Ye said during his 3-hour, 26-minute appearance on Drink Champs last week. “But tell me, could you even really run this interview? ’Cause Mav [Carter] didn’t run my interview,” he later added. “They blocked me out, the Jewish media blocked me out.”
Meanwhile, Boosie Badazz went after Ye for his George Floyd comments as well. “@kanyewest the hatred you have for Blacks is sad,” the Louisiana rapper tweeted on Sunday afternoon. “N they still support your coon ass. First Slavery was a choice, white lives matter, now George Floyd etc.N it’s sad that Blacks with a platform ain’t telling u shit for attacking our race like u do.”
Per George Floyd’s autopsy, fentanyl was actually found in his system. But the amounts were also deemed insufficient to be considered a contributing factor to his death. At the trial for former officer Derek Chauvin, cardiologist Dr. Jonathan Rich told the court the following: “I can state with a high degree of medical certainty that George Floyd did not die from a primary cardiac event, and he did not die from a drug overdose.”
In fact, the Hennepin County medical examiner’s office called Floyd’s death a homicide as the result of “cardiopulmonary arrest” augmented by “restraint, and neck compression.”
Dr. Martin Tobin, a pulmonologist and critical care specialist at Loyola University Medical Center, also gave expert testimony that supported the autopsy’s finding. “A healthy person subjected to what Mr. Floyd was subjected to would have died,” he said, as reported by the Associated Press.
In response to Ye’s, civil rights attorney Lee Merritt announced that Floyd’s family is weighing the possibility of taking legal action against the DONDA 2 rapper. “While one cannot defame the dead, the family of #GeorgeFloyd is considering suit for Kanye’s false statements about the manner of his death,” Merritt posted yesterday across social media. “Claiming Floyd died from fentanyl not the brutality established criminally and civilly undermines and diminishes the Floyd family’s fight.”
