Big Punisher

Christopher Rios, better known by his stage name Big Pun, was an American rapper who emerged from the underground rap scene in The Bronx in the late 1990s. He first appeared on albums from The Beatnuts, on the track "Off the Books", and on Fat Joe's second album Jealous One's Envy, on the track "Watch Out", prior to signing to Loud Records as a solo artist. Big Pun's career was cut short in 2000 at age 28 when he died of a fatal heart attack. He is survived by his wife, Liza Rios, and three children.


He grew up in a Puerto Rican community in New York City's South Bronx neighborhood. By all accounts from Rios's family, his early years were very difficult, including witnessing his mother's drug abuse, his father leaving the family, and a stepfather who was very hard on Rios. According to his grandmother, Rios would become angry and self-destructive, punching holes in the walls of his family's apartment. Rios dropped out of high school and for some time was homeless staying in abandoned buildings or at his friends' homes.


During the 1980s, he formed the Full a Clips Crew with Triple Seis, Prospect and Cuban Link who was at the time named "Lyrical Assassin". At this point Big Pun was operating under the alias Big Moon Dawg. Rios met fellow Puerto Rican and Bronx rapper Fat Joe in 1995 and made his commercial debut on Joe's second album, Jealous Ones Envy, in addition to appearing on a b-side to Joe's "Envy" single, "Fire Water" and "Watch Out."

Later, "I'm Not a Player Homie" was supported by a significant advertising campaign and became an underground hit. The song's remix, "Still Not a Player" produced by Knobody, became Big Pun's first major mainstream hit. His full-length debut Capital Punishment followed in 1998, and was the first album by a solo Latino rapper to go platinum, peaking at #5 on the Billboard 200. Capital Punishment was also nominated for a Grammy, but lost out on the award to Jay-Z's Vol. 2: Hard Knock Life. He became a member of Terror Squad, a New York-based group of rappers founded by Fat Joe, with most of the roster supplied by the now-defunct Full a Clips Crew who released their debut album The Album in 1999.
In 1999 he co-starred in the Albert Pyun-directed ghetto-movie Urban Menace, alongside his frequent collaborator Fat Joe.

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