Ice-T got some very cool news in a Manhattan courtroom today — his July charges for driving with a suspended license and no seatbelt were dismissed.
The rapper’s license had in fact never been suspended, prosecutors said in explaining the dismissal, blaming the whole thing on a New York DMV clerical error.
“That’s what I’m talking about!” the dressed-to-the-nines hip hop pioneer boasted as he walked triumphantly back out through the courtroom, pointing a finger at grinning defendants in the audience.
“Dismissed!” he told the courtroom full of smiling, fist-pumping fans.
“Like I said from the gate, I never broke the law,” he told reporters. “I never had knowledge of any suspension. That’s why I got so angry when they put me in handcuffs.”
Did he ever. Cops say Ice-T — real name Tracy Marrow — unleashed a torrent of profanity after he was pulled over in his 2009 Cadillac sedan near the Lincoln Tunnel, with his buxom wife Coco at his side.
The mirror of his car had brushed against a cop at a random checkpoint, officials said.
He was charged with driving with a suspended license, without valid insurance, and without a seatbelt — charges all now blamed on bad DMV records and wiped clean.
And he was taken in cuffs to the 10th precinct in Chelsea and given a ticket to return to court today.
It wasn’t long before the 52-year-old rapper-turned-actor, who has played Detective Fin Tutuola on “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” since 2000, gave his Twitter followers a good taste of his fury over being locked up for no reason.
“Some punk bitch rookie cop named Fisher made the arrest of his bull–t career today,” he sniped.
“Arresting the Notorious Ice-T for no seatbelt! [The cop] said, ‘I know who you are, and I don’t give a f–k!’ That was right after I called him a punk bitch.”
The Twitter-tirade may not have come close to the sentiments of his 1992 song, “Cop Killer,” in which the performer shared his thoughts on the advisability of killing police in retaliation for police brutality.
But he kept the harsh words coming. He repeated the “punk bitch” taunt a few weeks ago in a Webcast, and earlier this month vowed a revenge lawsuit against the DMV.
Now, all is forgiven, he said as he strode out of the courthouse, Coco beside him in high heels and a clingy black knit mini-dress.
“I was just upset. the cop took me to jai. We had a little tiff on the street. Both tempers were up.”
As for the charges, his lawyers, Eric Franz and Timothy Parlatore, chalked it up to a case of mo’ cars, mo’ problems.
Ice-T had had rides registered in New York, then dropped the insurance when he re-registered them a couple years back upon moving to Jersey. New York’s DMV recorded the insurance cancelation, but not that he’d turned in the registration, the lawyers explained.
“Whatever,” the rapper summed it up, saying he’s ditched any plans for lawsuits. “I hate courts. I am never coming back.”
Asked by a reporter where he was off to next — given his natty navy business suit, and her dress and heels — Ice-T laughed.
“Oh, I don’t know. I think we’ll go to Disney Land,” he said. “We’ll go to Denny’s.”