Suge Knight pleads no contest in 2015 fatal hit-and-run

Sept. 20 (UPI) -- Former hip-hop mogul Suge Knight faces up to 28 years in prison after pleading no contest Thursday to manslaughter stemming from a 2015 hit-and-run.

Prosecutors are seeking a sentence of 22 years for voluntary manslaughter and six years because this was his third felony.

The 53-year-old, born Marion Knight, was originally charged with murder after he ran over Terry Carter, a hip-hop record label owner, after an altercation in the parking lot of a hamburger restaurant in Compton, Calif.

Knight also ran over Cle "Bone" Sloan in the January 2015 incident, but he survived.

Knight, Carter and Sloan were longtime associates and Knight said the incident was an accident after a dispute got out of control. He said he feared Carter and Sloan were going to shoot him and his only option was to flee.

Surveillance footage shows Knight about to leave the restaurant parking lot while driving a red pickup truck. Carter and Sloan appear to be trying to talk to Knight, who backs up and rams through Sloan and then Carter, who gets taken under the truck.

Carter's widow, Lillian Carter, told the Los Angeles Times that Knight's sentence didn't bring her relief from a legal drama.

"I feel just as sick and heartbroken as I did the first moment of learning of Terry's death."

Knight's sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 4.

Editor's note: An earlier version of this report incorrectly indicated Suge Knight had already been sentenced.