The Rap Sheet Grows With Mystikal’s Arrest

The arrest of Mystikal this week in Louisiana on sexual assault and extortion charges adds yet another entry to a list that has reached a dizzying length: rappers whose gritty street rhymes seem to echo in their personal lives and in the nation’s courthouses. The arrest also endangers the career of one of the genre’s most potent stars.

The funk-minded rap of the raspy-voiced Mystikal has sold 6.1 million albums in the U.S. with hits such as the raunchy “Shake Ya Ass� and “Danger (Been So Long),� which made the New Orleans rhymer a staple star of urban radio and MTV. His persona has been as a handsome, often humorous stage performer whose work also has flashes of social commentary and gravitas, such as the song “Murderer,� about the slaying of his sister by her boyfriend.

Mystikal, whose real name is Michael Tyler, surrendered to police on Thursday for his alleged attack on a woman in his home. The woman has told police that the rapper demanded sex from her and threatened to turn her into police for check fraud against his bank account if she did not submit. The rapper was arrested with two other men who allegedly came to his home and took turns raping the 40-year-old woman.

If convicted of aggravated rape, Mystikal could face a life sentence. A conviction on the extortion charge, meanwhile, has a potential prison term of one to 15 years.

Those are numbing numbers for a man more accustomed to counting his hit songs and money. They present a grim situation for Jive Records, one of the great success stories in the music industry in recent years that now has two of its biggest stars, R. Kelly and Mystikal, facing sex-related felony charges that may injure their career viability even if the cases end in acquittals. R&B; star Kelly is charged with child pornography in his hometown of Chicago. A Jive spokeswoman referred inquiries on Friday to Michael Guy, the rapper’s attorney, who did not return calls by press time.

Mystikal’s music and success have put him among the ranks of top rappers, and now his criminal quandary lumps him in with the genre’s all-stars who have seen their names on court dockets and accused of violent acts: Sean “P. Diddy� Combs, Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg, Tupac Shakur, DMX, Eminem, Juvenile and dozens of others.

“It hasn’t hurt most of them, really, there’s something in hip-hop for some reason that fans take the music, not the person,� says Emmanuel “eMan� Coquia, music director for KPWR-FM (105.9), which counts Mystikal among the higher tiers of its playlist stars.

Most of the rappers have walked away from their brushes with the law with little or no damage to their fan base and, to some cynical appraisals, may have even enhanced their street credibility. Is it easier for rappers to rehabilitate their image after criminal cases than it is for other celebrities?

“That question presumes a rehabilitation is required,� says Fred Davis, a New York entertainment attorney whose clients include Busta Rhymes, Missy Elliott and Linkin Park. “If you are in ‘N Sync or you are a G- or PG-orientated artist, yes, absolutely, a parent might think twice before allowing their 13-year-old to buy a particular CD [by an artist facing criminal charges]. But the demographics for a rock or rap consumer are older and are less affected by it.�

There is a downside that rappers are not immune to, however. “We do live in a day and age that when people read a headline they presume guilt, which is terrible,� Davis said. “And if you are a celebrity you get that headline.�

While many of the rappers who veer in lyrics to violence and gangsta imagery are often the ones who find their lives imitating their art, Mystikal is known more for party music. He came up as an underground sensation as part of Master P’s No Limit legion of Southern rappers, but the thug life imagery of that collective did not define the protege as he went on to Jive.

Last month he told reporters he was recording “the Prince of the South,� a new album he expected to have in stores by year’s end.