Cash Money Records rap star Lil Wayne appeared in Arizona Superior Court to face numerous drug charges today.

Lil Wayne was hit with multiple drug charges and a weapons offense in January, but pled not guilty on all charges.

Today, Lil Wayne pled innocent to charges of possession of dangerous drugs, possession of a narcotic drug for sale, misconduct involving weapons and one count of possession of drug paraphernalia.

Lil Wayne was arrested on January 22, after DEA Agents stopped his tour bus near a border checkpoint in southwestern Arizona, about 75 miles East of Yuma.

A Border Patrol dog alerted officials to the presence of drugs and a subsequent search of the bus uncovered 41 grams of ecstasy, four ounces of marijuana, a little over an ounce of cocaine and a .40 caliber pistol, which is registered to Lil Wayne in Florida.

Police also confiscated $22,000 dollars in cash and two other firearms.

Out of the 11 occupants of the bus, two other men were arrested in the incident with Lil Wayne, although those men only face possession of marijuana charges.

Lil Wayne was released on $10,000 cash bond. His next court date is May 19.

A Brooklyn woman who claims she was assaulted by Foxy Brown with a Blackberry cell phone has filed a lawsuit against the rapper.

As reported earlier, Arlene Raymond filed a complaint against Brown last year claiming that the Brooklyn bred rapper hit her in the face with a Blackberry cell phone during an argument.
Brown turned herself in and was charged with felony assault, menacing, harassment and criminal possession of a weapon. She was then released on $5,000 bail.

According to The New York Post, Raymond filed her suit against Brown May 2 and is seeking unspecified damages.

Days after Brown hit Raymond with the Blackberry; she was tossed in jail for violating probation. Brown will be facing the Blackberry assault charge before a judge for the first time today, May 5th.

Billboard Biz is reporting that Jay-Z’s $150 million deal with Live Nation closed on Wednesday night.

The company filed a Form-8K with the SEC which states that the artist is getting 775,434 Live Nation shares, plus an option on an additional 500,000 with the exercise price of $13.73. The shares go to Marcy Media, the company affiliated with Jay-Z in connection with the formation of Roc Nation LLC, a joint entertainment venture between Live Nation and Jay-Z.

As previously reported, the Live Nation pact includes Roc Nation, as well as the Jay-Z’s own recordings and tours for the next 10 years. Live Nation will reportedly contribute $5 million each year in overhead for five years and offer $25 million to finance Jay-Z’s external acquisitions and investments, plus $10 million per album for a minimum of three albums within the deal’s term.

Jay-Z will also receive another $20 million for other rights including publishing and licensing. Live Nation is already producing the current Jay-Z/Mary J. Blige tour, which is putting up sellout numbers.

Jay-Z is in the process of setting up an educational trust for the children of Sean Bell, an unarmed man who was shot and killed by police after leaving his own bachelor party.

Sources have confirmed that Jay-z is working with Nicole Paultre Bell, Sean Bell’s widow, to establish stock-based trust funds for both of their children.

Nicole Bell was also featured in an ad for Jay-Z’s Rocawear “I Will Not Lose” advertising campaign.

Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon have wed, the NY Post reports.

The ceremony reportedly took place at the home Mariah just bought in Eleuthera in the Bahamas, a source close to Mariah said.

Guest at the wedding included Mariah’s longtime friend, rapper Da Brat.

Carey, 38, met the 27-year-old rapper-actor when he directed the video for her latest single, “Bye Bye,” in late March.

Cannon attended the premiere of Mariah’s film, Tennessee, at the Tribeca Film Festival in NYC on April 26.

Carey said it was “very nice” to work with Cannon, who, when asked what he loved about the singer, exclaimed, “Everything!”

It is also rumored that Mariah is sporting the estimated $2.5 million ring Cannon gave to his previous fiancé Selita Ebanks.

Black Eyed Peas to Perform in China Despite Criticism

Black Eyed Peas front man will.i.am says his group will go ahead with plans to perform in China despite calls for artists to boycott the country over its human rights record.

Celebrities such as Richard Gere are urging fellow entertainers to forgo trips to China until the country allows Tibet to decide its own future.

In an interview with the BBC, will.i.am called the recent crackdown “messed up” and thinks it was wrong to “punish a whole country.”

“They have all this Chinese boycott stuff — they want to boycott the games but do the people get punished when they have nothing to do with what’s going on?” he said. “If you boycott China, when do they boycott America for what we’re doing in Iraq?”

According to reports, internet blogger Perez Hilton will be joining Miss Jones’ Morning Show next week on New York’s famous hip-hop station Hot 97. Perez will give Miss Jones “Hot 97 Perez Hilton Updates” which will be a minute long synopsis of the latest celebrity gossip starting May 5th. Forbes Magazine labeled Perez Hilton the #1 web celebrity in 2007 and Hot 97’s program director says “Perez Hilton is an amazing personality with unprecedented Hollywood access, and making him part of the HOT 97 family adds another dimension to the legendary HOT 97 brand.”

New York City’s CW11 News is reporting that Lil Kim had her Bently repossessed recently. According to the report, two repo-men came to the Brooklyn rapper’s house and asked her to hand over the keys to which she said that her accountant would handle the situation. CW11 is reporting that Lil Kim was four to five months behind in payments for the car that is valued at $250-300,000.

When she was asked for comment on the falling economy or the repossession itself, kim replied “Oh please,” she responded. “Get the f*ck out of here. You’re so f*cking ridiculous.” The repo man told CW11 that “Apparently she didn’t want to cooperate,” “She basically told us to get off the property. We were hoping she would give us the keys, being that it was the right thing to do. It’s not her vehicle!” Lil’ Kim hasn’t commented yet.

 Flipmode has added Chauncey Black, formerly of BlackStreet, to its roster. The singer is currently working on his new album Church Boy, which currently does not have a release date.

“I wanted to get with a team that could give me that hip-hop feel but also a team that would give me creative control,” Chauncey Black said of his decision to sign with Flipmode. “Busta let me do my whole record. He saw the history with BlackStreet and trusted me.”

G-Unit’s new album “Terminate On Sight” will be Lloyd Banks first official release since the “Rotten Apple”, which debut in 2006.

According to Banks, who dropped out of the spotlight shortly after Rotten Apple was released, family issues prevented him from being 100 percent focused on promoting the album.

“Prior to that my mother, she was in and out the hospital [due to a heart attack],” Banks revealed to AllHipHop.com. “I was doin’ promos and interviews and some s**t like that and she had the first heart attack and I was there you know what I’m sayin.”

Banks went back to promoting his album when his mother suffered a second, more severe heart attack.

“I actually had to get her into the ambulance…so this is going on before I gotta make my way into Manhattan. The album came out the 10th, I got the call on the 27th.”

Additionally, Banks said he was disenfranchised with the state of the music business, as well as the way Rotten Apple was being received by critics and fans alike.

“I wasn’t happy about the way the music was received and I was on promo and I was dealing with a lot,” Banks continued. “There was resistance that I was being shown, to the plain eye and I was dealing with that. Those are the reasons that had me a little disgusted about the game. I was watching the s**t go on and it was confusing and then all this [his mother’s health] on top of it just made me not even want to even be part of that s**t for a good minute.”

Banks also responded to Game’s recent comment and prediction that like former G-Unit members The Game and Young Buck, he too would eventually leave 50 Cent’s G-Unit collective.

“People always say where would you be without 50,” Banks told AllHipHop.com. “I don’t think about s**t like that. That discredits all the work that I really did, the s**t is over my head.”