Sanyika Shakur

Sanyika Shakur (born Kody Dejohn Scott; November 13, 1963 – June 6, 2021), also known by his former street moniker Monster or Monster Kody, was an American author and former gangster. He was a member of the Los Angeles-based Eight Tray Gangster Crips. He got his nickname as a 13-year-old gang member when he beat and stomped a robbery victim until he was disfigured. Shakur claimed to have reformed in prison, joined the Republic of New Afrika movement, and wrote a 1993 memoir called Monster: The Autobiography of an L.A. Gang Member.

Monster describes how Shakur was drawn into gang life, his experiences as a gangster both on the street and in prisons, and eventually his transformation into a Black nationalist.

Shakur spent 36 months at San Quentin State Prison and five years at Pelican Bay State Prison, most of which was spent in solitary confinement, where he converted to Islam.

In March 2007, Shakur, already sought by police for parole violations and named on the city's most-wanted gang members list, was arrested by the Los Angeles Police Department for allegedly breaking into the home of an acquaintance and beating him in order to steal his car. The charges represented a possible third strike that could have sent Shakur back to prison for life. In May 2008, Shakur pleaded no contest to carjacking and robbery charges, and was sentenced to six years in state prison. Also in 2008, Shakur made his fiction debut with the publication of T.H.U.G. L.I.F.E. (Grove Atlantic Books). He was released from Pelican Bay after serving two-thirds of his 6-year sentence in August 2012.

Early life

Shakur was born Kody Dejohn Scott in Los Angeles, California, on November 13, 1963, to Ernest Scott and Birdie Canada, both from Houston, Texas. Kody was the fifth of six children, including four brothers and two sisters (Kevin, Kim, Kerwin, Kershaun, Kody, and Kendis). Shakur believed it was probable that he was the son of former Los Angeles Rams running back Dick Bass and that he was conceived during an adulterous affair that his mother was having with the football star, a claim for which there is no compelling evidence. Ernest Scott held a bitter resentment toward Birdie's affair and physically abused his wife regularly throughout Shakur's early childhood.

Ernest Scott physically and emotionally abused Kody, routinely beating him and showing deliberate favoritism toward his biological children over Shakur, which included taking the other children out to dinners, movies, and trips to his hometown of Houston and intentionally leaving Shakur behind. In 1970, Ernest and Birdie Scott divorced, and, for the next five years, Ernest Scott would visit the family on weekends but still openly displayed contempt for young Shakur.

In 1972, Birdie Scott moved her family into a house on West 69th Street and Denker Avenue in a very rough and gang-infested neighborhood on the west side of South Central Los Angeles. According to Shakur, his first encounter with street gangs occurred at age ten when he was assaulted by two 13-year-olds who stole his money. Due to Birdie Scott's frequent absences working several jobs to support her large family and the neglect that he received from Ernest Scott, young Shakur would often hang out on the streets of his new neighborhood. It was around this time that he began hanging around his neighbor Stanley Tookie Williams, the leader of the West Side Crips street gang.

In his memoir Blue Rage, Black Redemption, Tookie Williams recalled the occasions in which he and other adult members of the Crips would smoke PCP and lift weights at Williams's house. According to Williams, Shakur was always present at the house and would watch in awe as the gang members would lift weights and tell stories about gang fights and shootings that they had committed. In the book, Williams also expressed his regret regarding his behavior around the impressionable young Shakur, and he held himself personally responsible for exposing Shakur to drugs, as Shakur himself would later become a frequent PCP user.

Joining the Crips

In 1975, a member of the West Side Crips nicknamed Sidewinder formed a set called the Eight Tray Gangster Crips (also known as 83GC, ETG or ETGC) in Shakur's neighborhood. On the evening of June 15, 1975, the day of his sixth-grade graduation, Shakur was courted into (also known as being "jumped in," when gang members beat up the new recruit to see if he or she is brave enough to fight back and defend himself or herself) the ETGs.

Shakur and another gang member then hotwired a stolen car after which he and several members of the ETGs, all armed with revolvers and shotguns, tracked down members of the Brims street gang (a set of the Bloods) who had been hanging out in the Crips' neighborhood. The ETGs opened fire on a group of approximately 15 Brims, shooting several of them. Shakur, armed with a sawed-off 12-gauge shotgun and instructed not to return to the car unless he used all eight rounds of the weapon, shot several Brims gang members that evening.

Disfiguring an older black man

As a new member of the Crips, Shakur was mentored in the ways of gang-banging by Tray Ball. In 1977, at the age of 13, Shakur and Tray Ball attempted to rob an older black man who was walking through their neighborhood. The man punched Shakur in the face and, after being physically restrained by Tray Ball when he attempted to run, was kicked and stomped by Kody for approximately twenty minutes. Kody's attack left the man in a coma with his face permanently disfigured.

According to Shakur, Crips present at the crime scene overheard police officers saying that whoever assaulted the man was a "monster" and reported this back to him. From that point on, other members of the ETGs referred to Shakur as Monster, and he took the name as a street moniker.