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Lil' Wayne Says he Passed Rikers Time Playing Uno, Reading Bible, Report Says

By DNAinfo Staff on January 19, 2011 9:25am  | Updated on January 19, 2011 10:35am

Rapper Lil' Wayne said his eight month stretch at Riker's Island last year wasn't as difficult as he had imagined in a new Rolling Stone interview.
Rapper Lil' Wayne said his eight month stretch at Riker's Island last year wasn't as difficult as he had imagined in a new Rolling Stone interview.
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Associated Press

By Gabriela Resto-Montero

DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

MANHATTAN — Lil' Wayne can now add cell block Uno champion to his list of accolades after serving an eight-month stretch at Rikers Island for a gun possession conviction.

Lil' Wayne, whose real name is Dwayne Carter, became a master of the children's card game, cooked with other inmates and spent the rest of his time in jail reading the Bible cover to cover, he revealed in an interview with Rolling Stone.

"I'd bust a n---'s ass at Uno," Carter told the magazine.

"We'd gamble for phone time. I'd take a n---'s commissary: Lemme get them cookies, lemme get them chips, that soup."

As part of his prison work, the rapper worked as a suicide prevention aide for other inmates.

Authorities reportedly questioned Department of Correction Captain Latanya Brown in September on charges she was giving Lil' Wayne preferential treatment by allowing him to to skip yard recreation time and stay in his cell.

One of Lil' Wayne's first acts as a free man was to tweet about his release but the rapper had to delete his account over the weekend after hackers reportedly hijacked his handle, the New York Observer reported.

The impersonator poked fun at Lil' Wayne's prison time.

"The real reason I made 6'7 is cuz that's how tall the n---a in rikers was that raped me," read one post by the Twitter interloper.

The rapper was sentenced to a year in prison for gun possession after police found a .40 caliber handgun in his tour bus following a performance at the Beacon Theater in 2007.

Lil' Wayne's time behind bars didn't hinder him professionally. He released the best-selling record "I am Not a Human Being", which Rolling Stone gave four stars, while still incarcerated.

A who's who of Hip Hop, including Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, Kanye West and reigning chart-topper Nicki Minaj, all visited Lil' Wayne, according to Rolling Stone.

Embattled former Jets quarterback Brett Favre even called the prison to pass along an encouraging message, reportedly telling him to keep his head up.

Lil' Wayne said he kept a magazine cutout of a woman for company in his cell. He took advantage of his free time to read biographies of Jimi Hendrix, Anthony Kiedis and Vince Lombardi while behind bars.

Lil' Wayne read the Bible for the first time in jail and characterized it as "deep."

"I liked parts where one character was once this, but he ended up being that," he said.

"Like he'd be dissing Jesus, and then he ends up being a saint. That was cool."