Warrant Out for Knight Associate

An associate of rap music mogul Marion “Suge” Knight was charged Tuesday with the attempted murder of a reputed gang rival, prosecutors said.

Timothy “Tim Roo” McDonald, 34, was accused of trying to kill a member of a rival gang last month as revenge for the unsolved murder of another Knight associate, who was shot to death in South Los Angeles six days before.

Sheriff’s deputies alleged that they saw McDonald, who was at large Tuesday, prepare to shoot a suspected gang member in Compton on Oct. 22. Two deputies said they saw a vehicle pull alongside the pedestrian. McDonald then pointed a handgun at the gang member, according to the deputies’ report.

McDonald and the driver fled when they saw the deputies. McDonald, who told deputies he worked for Knight’s Tha Row Records, formerly Death Row Records, was arrested after a short pursuit, but later released. A warrant was issued for his arrest Tuesday.

Knight was an influential figure in the development of rap and hip-hop music. However, he has long been closely associated with the violence that has claimed the lives of several of its brightest stars and many of his associates.

The charges against McDonald are the first to come out of a sheriff’s task force investigation into a string of shootings, primarily involving members of Blood gang factions. McDonald, according to a sheriff’s incident report, is a member of the Blood faction Mob Town Pirus.

“There are numerous criminal incidents committed by this street gang being investigated by sheriff’s homicide detectives” and gang investigators, Sheriff’s Lt. Bob Rifkin of Operation Safe Streets, the sheriff’s gang unit, said Tuesday.

Rifkin said Knight is not a suspect in the current investigation.

The probe is not related to the unsolved killings of two of rap’s biggest stars, Tupac Shakur and Christopher Wallace (also known as Biggie Smalls and Notorious B.I.G.).

Investigators allege that McDonald was attempting to retaliate for the Oct. 16 murder of Henry “Hendog” Smith, 33, a Tha Row Records employee. Smith designed the firm’s logo, a hooded man in an electric chair. He was waiting in his vehicle while his girlfriend used a pay phone in South Los Angeles when his assailant walked up, leaned into the car and fired five or six shots.

McDonald’s brother was another Knight associate killed this year. Alton “Buntry” McDonald, 37, was gunned down in April at a gas station.

Sheriff’s investigators earlier this month arrested -- and then released without charges -- three other associates of Knight for allegedly conspiring to kill another reputed gang rival as revenge for Alton McDonald’s death.

The murder June 7 of Eric Letheal Daniel, 29, investigators say, stems from a rivalry between the Mob Town Pirus and Fruit Town Pirus. The two Blood factions had a falling out, they say, setting the stage for the recent violence.

Rifkin said vanloads of evidence was gathered from the locations and investigators still have not had time to sift through it thoroughly.

In early morning sweeps by 175 sheriff’s deputies, warrants were served at 16 sites in Southern California and Las Vegas on Nov. 16, including Knight’s Beverly Hills office and his homes in three cities.

The raid, sheriff’s investigators say, was necessary given the history of violence of those under investigation.

One of two others picked up during the raids on unrelated drug possession charges was Darryl “Biggie” Small. He was held in custody on an out-of-state probation violation.

According to a sheriff’s report, Small was driving the car from which Timothy McDonald pointed the gun on Oct. 22.

Deputies reported that as McDonald pointed the weapon, the man on the sidewalk at 112th and Vernon Avenue covered his face and ducked. Small, according to the report, saw the patrol car and alerted McDonald, who pulled his weapon back into the car.

Sheriff’s investigators say they have not been able to find the victim, but decided to push for prosecution based on the deputies’ eyewitness statements.

During the early days of Death Row, Knight would brag that his company hired ex-cons and gang members to give them a second chance.

Knight himself was sentenced to prison in early 1997 for a probation violation stemming from his participation, along with Shakur and four reputed members of the Bloods, in a brawl in a Las Vegas hotel lobby on Sept. 7, 1996. With Knight at his side, Shakur was mortally wounded three hours later in a drive-by shooting near the Strip.