After allegedly stabbing a homeless man to death, Kidd Creole pleaded not guilty to a grand jury’s second degree murder indictment at his arraignment in Manhattan Supreme Court, ABC News reported.
After entering his plea, he was remanded and ordered back into court Sept. 6 for defense motions and a possible bail application.
Nathaniel “Kidd Creole” Glover, a member of the pioneering rap group, was arrested earlier this month after accusations that the rapper used a small knife to stab the man twice in the chest and once in the head in Midtown Manhattan. The homeless man (identified as 55-year-old John Jolly) allegedly called Creole a gay slur and died at Bellevue Hospital.
Authorities reportedly used surveillance footage to identify the rapper and believe his motive was a reaction to the gay slur.
According to the criminal complaint, which was obtained by ABC News, Glover and Jolly got into an argument, and Glover allegedly “pulled out a knife that he had attached to his forearm with rubber bands and stabbed [Jolly] in the chest with the knife two times.”
As a member of hip-hop group Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, Glover was the first rap group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007. The group signed with Sugarhill Records in 1980 with their debut single “Freedom”, reaching No. 19 on the R&B chart and selling over 50,000 copies. The following year, they released “The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on the Wheels of Steel.” Then in 1982, the group released “The Message,” which peaked at No. 4 in the R&B chart and No. 62 in the pop chart.
Since his heyday, Glover was working as a security guard at a building near where the stabbing took place.
According to court records, Glover voluntarily gave a videotaped statement to police after they arrested him at his house in the Bronx. Police believe Jolly was either propositioning the rapper or preparing to rob him. Glover told police that he stabbed Jolly because he was afraid of him.
