Ol' Dirty Bastard Is Sentenced On 2 Charges

After pleading no contest to charges that he made terrorist threats and wore body armor, Wu-Tang Clan member Ol' Dirty Bastard was ordered on Friday (11/19) to spend a year in a drug rehabilitation clinic and was placed on three years of probation.

The plea bargain covers two of ODB's recent run-ins with the law in the Los Angeles area: a September 1998 incident in which he was charged with threatening to kill bouncers at the West Hollywood House of Blues after they ejected him from the club, and a February case in which he was found to be wearing body armor when police reportedly cited him for stopping his car in a no parking zone.

The rapper, whose real name is Russell Jones, was reportedly the first to be charged under a recently-enacted California law that bars convicted felons from wearing body armor. (In 1993, ODB was convicted on a felony charge of second-degree assault in New York.) ODB's attorney, Robert Shapiro, previously argued that the body-armor law is unconstitutional and that the search of his client was illegal.

ODB, who has gained as much fame for his rap sheet as for his rap albums, was also ordered to pay a $500 fine. Probationary terms forbid him from drinking or possessing alcohol, using drugs, associating with drug users, wearing body armor and carrying a gun, according to The Associated Press. He also reportedly was ordered to undergo psychiatric and anger management counseling.

ODB voluntarily entered a live-in rehabilitation clinic in Pasadena, Calif., on Aug. 26, and the judge credited him for the time he's already spent in the clinic. If he manages to stay out of trouble for the duration of his probationary term, ODB's felony charge of making a terrorist threat will be reduced to a misdemeanor.

While this sentence addresses ODB's legal troubles on the West coast, problems remain in the East. In March, New York police claimed they found three vials of crack cocaine in his car after a traffic stop. In late September, officers claimed they found cocaine and marijuana in ODB's car after he allegedly ran a red light. Neither case has progressed because ODB has been tied up in the California court system. According to the New York Daily News, ODB has been convicted on nine crimes in New York since 1987.

In January, New York City police pulled over ODB for allegedly driving erratically and with no lights on. They then fired five shots at ODB, claiming shots were fired from his car. A grand jury didn't indict him, however, because police couldn't produce the gun ODB allegedly fired and gun residue tests failed to prove that he fired a gun. ODB argued that police must have mistaken a cell phone for a gun, and has vowed to sue police over the incident.

Also this year, charges that ODB threatened to kill a former girlfriend were dropped because of a lack of evidence.

In a case that is still outstanding, a bench warrant was issued for ODB's arrest in August because he failed to appear in court to face charges that he stole a pair of shoes last year in Virginia Beach, Va.