On March 15, Eric “Eazy-E” Wright lay in the intensive care unit of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. He was 31 years old and fighting for his life. Heavily sedated, Eazy-E had a respirator tube running down his throat to help him breathe. In the cramped, fluorescent-lit room, a few close friends and Tomica Woods-his new wife and the mother of his youngest son-gathered around his bed.
“We told him we loved him, ” says Jacob T., a six-foot-three, 300-pound Samoan, one of Eazy’s longtime twin bodyguards. He and his brother, John T., were with Eazy through most of his last days. “But he couldn’t talk. Then we said, ‘If you can hear us, just squeeze our hand.’ He did.”
Big Man (a.k.a. Mark Rucker), who grew up with Eazy in Compton, removed a gold ring his wife had given him on their 10th anniversary. He slipped it on Eazy’s index finger. “I told him, ‘I want you to give this back to me when you get out of here.’ ” But Eazy never got out. His immune system had become too weak to fight off the infection that was ravaging his lungs.
About a week later, Eric Wright fell unconscious and remained so until he died on March 26, 1995, at 6:35 p.m., from AIDS-related pneumonia.
Rest In Peace Eric.
