John Forté (born January 30, 1975) is a rapper and producer. Forté began his professional music career when he was introduced to The Fugees by Lauryn Hill in the early 1990s. He co-wrote and produced two songs on their multi-platinum and Grammy-winning 1996 album, The Score.
After the group broke up in 1997, Forté released his debut solo album, Poly Sci in 1998, which was produced by Wyclef Jean. The album sold 79,000 copies, a disappointment blamed in part on the fact that "the record's project manager quit Sony a week before the album was released, and Epic put little cash behind its promotional tour."
In 2000, Forté was arrested at Newark International Airport after accepting a briefcase containing $1.4 million worth of liquid cocaine; he was charged with possession with intent to distribute cocaine and conspiracy to distribute. He was convicted and sentenced to the mandatory minimum 14 years after being found guilty, and incarcerated at FCI Loretto, a low-security federal prison in central Pennsylvania.
Carly Simon and her son Ben Taylor have been advocates on Forte's behalf, believing he did not receive a fair trial, fought for an appeal of the mandatory minimum drug laws that remove a judge’s discretion in a case; they met Forté through Taylor's cousin who was a classmate of Forté's at Phillips Exeter.
On November 24, 2008, Forté's prison sentence was commuted by President George W. Bush. He will be released on December 22nd after serving over seven years of the original 14 year sentence.
www.wikipedia.com
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