Fat Joe Reveals He's Facing Jail Time For Tax Evasion

Original Story Though some artists brush off their legal issues, Fat Joe is acutely aware of just how serious his are.

After pleading guilty to tax evasion in December, the Bronx rapper didn't dance around the issue when discussing it with MTV's "RapFix Live."

"I can't really explain that 'cause I got a real court case going on, like facing jail time. But I guess after June 24. Hopefully, it goes well," said Joe.

Ultimately, Joe took responsibility for having to pay the money, but didn't accept the blame for not paying the taxes on time. "At the end of the day, I'm paying all the money back that's owed — actually I have and I'ma just go like a man, stand up," he said, before qualifying, "You gotta understand we hire guys who are supposed have Harvard degrees to take care of us."

Joe explained that artists typically hire others to manage their finances, which is how artists can end up in trouble. "All the time you see artists, the first thing they did to you when you caught money was introduce you to a bunch of fancy guys with bow ties who are gonna take care of your money and all that and then you always see an artist or a celebrity or somebody like that goin' down for it and these guys never go down for it."

Joey Crack faces up to two years in prison for failing to pay income taxes for the years 2007 and 2008, amounting to roughly $700,000.