The next day, thinigs took an even darker turn. News reports of his indictment quoted an informant whom told investigators that Johnson had called Tupac “a sucker”and bragged about shooting him at Quad, an incident that jumped started the coastal hip hop war of the mid 90’s. The New York daily news quoted the informant as saying that “Tupac was not a real gangster and that he had shot him, to discipline him”.
The feds seem to believe the informants words and the following statement was given to the Daily News by a police spokesperson , “We hope that [king tut] arrest will lead to solving the murk of Tupac Shakur”.
In spite of the fact that no evidence could be produced to solve the murk much less the shooting of Tupac in N.Y, the Daily News ran with the story under the headline: “FEDS VOW TO BURY KING TUT”.
Walter Johnson-stick up kid, alleged k!ller of tupac, has the most regal of street names, born to a brooklyn -under humble conditions. During the mid 70’s, Johnson and his friends attended hip hop block parties uptown , by the dawn of the 80’s , Johnson was drawn to the sinister side of the streets.
During this time period of the pre-guliani era, one could easily earn his stripes on the street by arming himself with a pistol and wearing a ski-mask. It was this part of street life, which Johnson relished as he commited strings of armed robberies and various street heists with ease.
“I was very angry, or you could say disturbed”, Johnson explains..”By allowing yourself to be manipulated by into situations that will affect you for your entire life, will result in lifetime reprucussions.”
Johnson’s rep became cemented in stone in 1979, when he was picked up on a charge relating to a sting of unsolved robberies. “When my mother came to get me from the precint, the police asked her..”What other name he goes by besides Walter Johnson?..she responded “Tut is his nickname”..the superior officer replied ..”King Tut?”, my mother said..”No , that is not his name”..the officer responded..”Yeah I think his name will be KING TUT..cause he’s from the county of Kings.”
With an alias given to him by an officer, King Tut lived up to his title as his “get money” schemes grew more outrageous and more frequency. On August 8, 1983, Tut robbed 6 passengers on a Queens to Brooklyn bus; a week later the hold up of a subway car full of passengers in downtown Brooklyn was attributed to Tut as well, and little more than a month later, on Sept 12th, he executed the robbery of more than 300 members of a Jehovah Witness Hall. Yet inspite of his healthy criminal spree, Tut virtually remained “untouched” with the exception foa 2 to 6 year jail sentence , in which he would eventually be parolled after just 3 years.
But in January or 1993, tut’s luck with the law would come into an abrubt end. At a Brooklyn barbershop, King Tut shot a plainsclothes officer in full crowd view with Tut’s five year old son accompanying him, the officer named Richard Aviles was partially paralyzed from the waist down, Johnson says that him and his son was ambushed by Aviles without provocation and never identified himself as a cop.
"He was dressed like a thug" , Johnson recalls, with his voice trailing off.."and he produced a weapon , ran up behind my son
In spite of the broad daylight violence and life threatening injuries of the officer, a Brooklyn jury found Johnson not guilty of the crime of attempted murk, and this profoundly upset the NYPD. After serving a year for a minor armed robbery charge, King Tut vowed to his family and friends that he would leave the streets for good , as well as salvaging what little freedom he gained after surviving a firefight with an officer as well as beating prosecution.
To achieve his goal , King Tut like many of his street peers sought entry into the lucrative rap industry, which at the time was capitalizing off the ‘gangsta’ lifestyle in the form of “thuggary” via Tupac and big money “dons” such as Biggie.
It just so happen that King Tut would set up a meeting with one of the biggest advocates of this form of entertainment, Sean “Puffy” Combs, “I explained to Puffy that I can be very beneficial to you, you don’t even have to give me money, I have income coming in, I just need your insight”, Puff was like..”Yo I heard alot of bad things about you man, I don’t know”, Puff was told by many that I was not to be trusted and can do nothing but harm.” As the meeting was coming to a conclusion, with nothing productive seeming to come out of it, Tut made this plea..”Look if you don’t want to deal with me based on what I did to you or some people[..]ociated with you, I can respect that”..but to not deal with me just ‘based on what others might have said to you, just ain’t right!”
Puff finally was convinced, and agreed to mentor King Tut in the complexities of doing business in the hip hop world, by just following his directives. Walter “King Tut” Johnson really wanted to follow Puff’s demands, but Tut had plans of his own according to rivals of Bad Boy as well as the Feds.
Once Tupac Shakur fingerpointed King Tut and Brooklyn based manager Jimmy Rosemond in his shooting at Quad, Johnson became a certified suspect. Johnson says “Pac fingered me in the shooting, based on what people told Pac, Johnson refuses to reveal whom, all he says is that people on Rikers and the streets said it was “Tut from Cypress.” The notion that Tut was the triggerman made perfect sense to Tupac , because of an east coast cabal consisting of Puffy, Haitian Jack, Biggie and Jimmy “Henchmen” Rosemond seemed capable of conducting the attack. “Because of my[..]ociation with Puff Combs and Bad Boy”, Johnson says. For his part Henchmen denies any involvement.
