Ice-T Reflects on Losing Coolio & Michael K. Williams to Drug Overdoses: ‘That Was the Nail in the Coffin’

Ice-T has opened up about the losses of his close friends Coolio and actor Michael K. Williams, who passed away in 2022 and 2021, respectively, due to drug overdoses.

“I don’t do drugs, but I never expected it,” Ice-T told Entertainment Weekly in an interview published Friday (Aug. 22). “When it hit Coolio and it hit Mike, that was the nail in the coffin. That’s when you go, ‘Yo, this s‑‑t is real.’ You know what I’m saying? It’s real.”

He continued: “[I] didn’t know that it could kill people so easily … They have people out here, chemists that are putting this s‑‑t into different drugs, and people have started dying. Now the word on the street is like, ‘Yo, this s‑‑t will kill you.’”

The “Gangsta’s Paradise” rapper died at age 59 in September 2022. A spokesperson for the family relayed to TMZ at the time that there were traces of heroin and methamphetamines in his system. Coolio’s history of severe asthma and smoking also “played a factor in his death and his body’s inability to fight back.”

As for The Wire actor, Williams overdosed at his Brooklyn penthouse in September 2021 after taking fentanyl-laced heroin, which caused his death.

Ice-T is also on board as an executive producer and host of A&E’s Fame and Fentanyl documentary, which is set to premiere on Aug. 25. The doc explores drug overdoses of celebrities such as Prince, Angus Cloud, Tom Petty and the aforementioned Michael K. Williams.

“Everyone knows someone who has fallen victim to fentanyl,” Ice T says in a trailer for the documentary. “These are the stories that everyone needs to hear.”

According to the CDC, drug overdoses dropped by 27 percent in America in 2024 (80,391) compared to the 110,037 overdose-related deaths in 2023.