Ike Turner Jr. — the son of the late Tina Turner and her former husband, Ike Turner — was arrested in Texas on Saturday, May 6, just weeks before her heartbreaking death, HollywoodLife has confirmed. According to the Alvin, Texas police department’s report, Ike Jr., who is a Grammy award-winning musician, was charged with crack cocaine possession and tampering with evidence. He was also sentenced to 18 days in jail.
On Saturday, May 6, at approximately 12:09am, an Alvin Police Officer pulled over Ike Jr., 64. A traffic stop was conducted on a vehicle for the headlight or taillight being out, and a search led to the driver, Ike Jr., being arrested and charged with possession of a controlled substance (crack cocaine) and tampering with evidence. Police told PEOPLE that Ike tried consuming the narcotics before they could get a hold of them. “He tried to eat the drugs before the officers could seize them from him,” said Capt. Q.T. Arendell of the Alvin Police Dept.
Ike Jr. has been detained at the Brazoria County Jail for the past month and has not posted $70,000 bail, according to further jail records obtained by HollywoodLife. Because of this, Ike Jr. was behind bars when his mother died in her home in Switzerland on May 24.
It’s not clear whether Ike Jr. and his mother were on speaking terms at the time of her death. In 2018, he told the Daily Mail that he hadn’t talked to her in over a decade. He worked as her sound engineer, following her split from her abusive ex-husband, Ike Turner Sr. However, that gig didn’t last for too long, as his father wasn’t happy about it. Ike Jr. alleged his father, who battled a lifelong drug addiction and died of an overdose in 2007, beat him “in the head with a nickel-plated .45 pistol” because of his working relationship with his mother, who adopted him during her relationship with Ike.
“Tina raised me from the age of two. She’s the only mother I’ve ever known,” he told the Daily Mail in 2018. “I haven’t talked to my mother since God knows when – probably around 2000. I don’t think any of my brothers have talked to her in a long time either.” While Ike had six children at the time of meeting Tina, she only adopted two of them, with one being Ike Jr.
Ike Jr. followed in his dad’s and adopted mom’s footsteps and has enjoyed a career in the music industry. Most recently, he and singer Sweet Randi Love played in a tribute band, The Love Thang Band, and released the single “Yes to Life” last year.