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Legal
Judge orders arrest of “dead” rapper Tim Dog
By Andy Malt | Published on Thursday 23 May 2013
Rapper Tim Dog, real name Tim Blair, best known for his 1991 track ‘Fuck Compton’, has had an arrest warrant issued against him, despite being dead since February. Or not, as it turns out.
Blair was previously in the news in 2011 after pleading guilty to conning Esther Pilgrim, a woman he met on an online dating site, out of $32,000. He was given five years probation and ordered to repay $19,000 to Pilgrim at a rate of $100 per month, which he did until February this year, when Pilgrim says she was informed of his death. It was also widely reported in the US music media, including Billboard, Rolling Stone and Pitchfork, that he had passed away following a diabetes-related seizure.
However, having initially taken the news at face value, Pilgrim later decided to look up information on Blair’s death and was unable to find anything official. “There was nothing of what you would normally find”, she told WREG Memphis News Channel 3. “What city? Who found him? There was nothing with any type of concrete details”.
She added that she believes the rapper may have informed about 20 other people around the world about his supposed death in a bid to circumvent other debts, that together could top $2 million. Which would explain his potential keenness to disappear.
Yesterday, reports WREG Memphis, a judge issued a warrant for Blair’s arrest, as evidence mounted that he was in fact still alive. Prosecutor Steven Jubera said: “I need proof [of his death]. I need a death certificate showing that’s he’s dead because as far as I’m concerned, he’s alive. Nobody said where he died, nobody said where he was buried, which is very odd for an obituary… at the bare minimum he would get arrested and sit in jail until his court hearing”.
Fellow rapper Ced Gee has revealed that he was asked to speak at Blair’s funeral but refused because no death certificate could be produced, adding that he believes that, in the end, no funeral was held at all.
