TUESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2005

D.A. BROWN: RAPPER DMX ADMITS TO VIOLATING TERMS OF CONDITIONAL RELEASE FOLLOWING 2004 JFK AIRPORT INCIDENT
Will be Sentenced to 60 Days in Jail and Ordered to Pay $1,000 Fine

Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown today announced that rapper DMX has pleaded guilty to violating the conditions of his release following a June 2004 John F. Kennedy International Airport parking lot gate crash incident and will be sentenced to serve 60 days in jail.

According to District Attorney Brown, in a December 8, 2004 proceeding in Criminal Court in Kew Gardens, DMX – whose real name is Earl Simmons – pled guilty to Reckless Endangerment in the Second Degree and Operating a Motor Vehicle While Under the Influence of Alcohol or Drugs and admitted that he drove a vehicle recklessly while under the influence of Valium. He was then sentenced to a conditional discharge and was directed to pay a $1,000 fine and to forfeit his personalized 1998 Ford Expedition SUV valued at $13,200 in which a police-style emergency response flashing light and siren package valued at an additional $2,500 had been installed.

“In being conditionally discharged last December following his admission that while under the influence of drugs he recklessly engaged in conduct which created a substantial risk of serious physical injury to others, it was my hope that the defendant had learned that he had a responsibility to obey the law and that he might have been encouraged to act responsibly and lawfully in the future,” said District Attorney Brown. “It is now obvious that the lesson was lost on the defendant. His subsequent actions exhibited total contempt for the legal system and recklessly endangered the public as well. Perhaps now the defendant will learn that he will be held accountable for his actions and that being a celebrity does not put him above the law.”

District Attorney Brown said Simmons, 34, of 142 McLein Street in Mount Kisco, New York, appeared today at a hearing before Justice Dorothy Chin-Brandt and admitted that one week after being sentenced on December 8, 2004, for the JFK incident, he was charged with driving a motor vehicle at 104 miles per hour on Route 684 in Westchester County and that on April 15, 2005, he was driving a vehicle that was involved in an accident on the Major Deegan Expressway in the Bronx with two other vehicles, one of which was an unmarked police car. In each incident, his driver’s license had either been suspended or revoked. Justice Chin-Brandt set sentencing for November 17, 2005, at which time she indicated that she would sentence the defendant to 60 days in jail and to pay a fine of $1,000. She also ordered that he not drive between today and his date of sentencing.

District Attorney Brown said that, according to the criminal charges filed in the earlier case, at 8:10 p.m. on June 24, 2004, Simmons, while operating a black 1998 Ford Expedition at Parking Lot Green outside Terminals One, Two and Three at John F. Kennedy International Airport, crashed through the parking lot exit gate after telling the attendant to let him leave the lot because he was a federal agent. Immediately upon exiting the parking lot, the defendants were apprehended by Port Authority of New York and New Jersey police officers.

District Attorney Brown said that, according to the criminal charges, Simmons was additionally alleged to have ordered the driver of another vehicle inside an adjacent parking lot to get out of his vehicle after Simmons grabbed the driver’s seat belt buckle and attempted to pull him from the vehicle, stating that he was an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The District Attorney said that a police search resulted in the recovery from the vehicle of numerous Valium and Percocet tablets.

Assistant District Attorney Christina Hanophy, Chief Counter-Terrorism and Airport Investigations Unit in the District Attorney’s Organized Crime and Rackets Bureau prosecuted the case under the supervision of Assistant District Attorneys Gerard A. Brave, Bureau Chief, and Marc P. Resnick, Deputy Bureau Chief, and the overall supervision of Executive Assistant District Attorney for Investigations Peter A. Crusco and Deputy Executive Assistant District Attorney for Investigations Linda M. Cantoni.