Celebs who were target of failed hits – near-fatal shooting, 40 wounds and sick note

He was the reggae legend who inspired millions of fans with hits like Get Up, Stand Up and No Woman, No Cry.

Now a new biopic movie Bob Marley: One Love, starring Kingsley Ben-Adir, is in cinemas and charts the life of the Jamaican singer.

Marley died tragically in 1981, aged just 36 but the debate about who tried to assassinate the star five years earlier is still very much alive.

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Daily Star looks at what happened and some other celebs who were the target of failed hits.

Bob Marley

On December 3, 1976, seven men raided Bob Marley’s home in Kingston, Jamaica. His wife Rita was shot in the head, then Marley himself took two bullets to the chest and arm. Two others were wounded. They would all eventually recover. The attack came just before Marley was set to give a concert in the country, to help end factional violence and the chilled star called the hit: “One of them things.” But who was behind it?

Mysteriously, Marley’s bodyguards went missing that night. Suspects have included gangsters and political rivals of Jamaican PM Michael Manley and the alleged shooters were executed, with one claiming they did it for the CIA in return for cocaine and guns .Marley later died from melanoma skin cancer which spread from under the nail of a big toe after he refused treatment because of his Rastafarian beliefs. A claim that an ex-CIA agent had injected the star with a cancer virus has since been debunked.

Andy Warhol

Known for works like Campbell’s Soup Cans, the pop artist was the victim of a shocking shooting inside his own studio. The culprit was radical feminist Valerie Solanas – angry that he’d lost her play manuscript. On June 3, 1968, she fired a handgun three times at Warhol while he was on the phone, hitting vital organs and leaving him with a 50-50 chance of survival. He did recover but had to wear a lifelong surgical corset. Warhol died, aged 58, due to cardiac arrhythmia in 1987 and Solanas was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and served three years in jail.

50 Cent

Early in his career, the American rapper was the victim of a near-fatal shooting. The 24-year-old was sitting in a car in New York, on May 24, 2000 when a gunman approached and shot him nine times, including in his chest and face, before escaping.Fiddy spent 13 days in hospital and took five months to recover – he still has a bit of one bullet lodged in his tongue.The alleged attacker Darryl Baum was himself shot three weeks later and killed, while the singer said cheating death made him think: “I must have a purpose in life.”

George Harrison

On December 30, 1999, the ex-Beatle almost perished when maniac Michael Abram broke into his Oxfordshire home. Armed with a knife Abram grappled with the star, stabbing him in the chest and puncturing his lung .George’s quick-thinking wife Olivia then hit Abram over the head with a lamp, knocking out the attacker. But the musician, wounded 40 times, later said: “I believed I had been fatally stabbed.” Abram – who was convinced the Beatle was a witch – spent some time in a mental hospital and later said he regretted his actions. George got better, but would die from cancer at 58 in 2001.

Mick Jagger

Biker gang the Hell’s Angels were allegedly hired as security guards for $500 and a case of beer when The Rolling Stones headlined the Altamont Speedway Free Festival in the US in 1969. During the chaotic gig 18-year-old Meredith Hunter was stabbed to death in a scuffle between the Angels after drawing a gun. They were angered when, in the aftermath, the Stones shunned them. Some members vowed to assassinate singer Mick Jagger at his Long Island beach home. Heavily armed, they set out in a boat for the property, but their plot went awry when the craft capsized in a storm.

Monica Seles

The world of tennis was left in shock when the world women’s number one was stabbed on court. During the Yugoslavian star’s match in 1993 at a tournament in Germany, a man in the crowd ran up and knifed the 19-year-old with a nine-inch blade between the shoulder blades. Seles took weeks to recover in hospital and quit the sport for two years. Initially there were fears that the attack might have been politically motivated, but the attacker turned out to be Günter Parche, a German fan obsessed with rival player Steffi Graf. Described as a ‘mentally unbalanced loner’ he was handed a mere two-year suspended sentence.

Joss Stone

Armed with a samurai sword, hammers and knives, hapless Kevin Liverpool and Junior Bradshaw set off to abduct singer Joss Stone from her Devon home in 2011 and then behead her. Fortunately, then 24-year-old Joss was not at home and locals reported the pair acting suspiciously. Police found detailed handwritten plans for the murder, which included dumping the Super Duper Love songbird’s body in a river and burgling her house. Bradshaw was eventually sentenced to 10 years and Liverpool to six-and-a-half years behind bars.*Bob Marley: One Love is in cinemas now.

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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk