Marion Hugh "Suge" Knight Jr. is an American music executive and the co-founder and former CEO of Death Row Records, who was a central figure in gangsta rap's commercial success. This feat is attributed to the record label's first two album releases: Dr. Dre's The Chronic in 1992 and Snoop Dogg's Doggystyle in 1993. During 1995, Tupac Shakur began a prison sentence of up to four and a half years. Knight struck a deal with Shakur that October, paying his bail and freeing him from prison pending an appeal of his conviction, while signing him to Death Row Records. In 1996, the label released Shakur's greatest commercial success, All Eyez on Me. That September, after departing a Mike Tyson boxing match in Las Vegas, a group that included Knight and Shakur assaulted Orlando Anderson, a Southside Compton Crips gang member. Three hours later, someone shot into the car that Knight was driving and fatally wounded Shakur.

Dr. Dre and rap mogul Dr. Dre co-founded Death Row Records. Later, he established Black Kapital Records.