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1. Tupac

He’s a legend whose life was cut way too short by a hail of gunfire, and his untimely passing has canonized him in some ways. But Lesane Parish Crooks — later reborn as Tupac Amaru Shakur — also had a few run-ins with the law thanks to some unscrupulous dealings with women, and it’s the incident that occurred in November 1993 that, ultimately, was one of the major contributing factors to his untimely death: after he was charged with sexually assaulting a woman in his hotel room (Shakur claimed the sex was consensual), he was convicted & sentenced to 1 1/2 to 4 1/2 years in prison. After serving 11 months of the sentence, Death Row head honcho Suge Knight bailed him out (in exchange for Shakur to release 3 albums on Death Row). Many in the hip-hop world believe that it was this debt to Suge Knight that ultimately placed the rapper in harm’s way, and were it not for Shakur’s indentured servitude to Knight, Shakur would be alive today. We’ll never know for sure.

Follow Bernadette Giacomazzo on Twitter at @berngiacomazzo.

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