Former New Orleans Officer Who Saved Lil Wayne’s Life as a Kid Dies at 65

“Uncle Bob,” the New Orleans officer who help saved Lil Wayne‘s life after the rapper shot himself in the chest age 12, has died.

On Friday, NOLA.com first reported that Robert “Uncle Bob” Hoobler was found dead in his home. The name is very familiar among Weezy fans as Lil’ Wayne has openly talked about the incident that changed his life forever.

In 1994, 12-year-old Lil Wayne shot himself in the chest with a pistol in his mother’s apartment. At the time, Hoobler was an off-duty police officer and heard the incident report when he went to the scene with a fellow officer, Kevin Balencier. Hoobler carried Wayne to the cruiser’s backseat and transported him to a nearby hospital.

Wayne has thanked the officer countless times for saving life and used music to speak on the incident in the past. In his twelfth studio album, Tha Carter V, “Let It All Work Out,” he rapped about what happened that day:

I found my momma’s pistol where she always hide it
I cry, put it to my head and thought about it
Nobody was home to stop me, so I called my auntie
Hung up, then put the gun up to my heart and pondered
Too much was on my conscience to be smart about it
Too torn apart about it, I aim where my heart was pounding