Actor Michael Jai White reveals his oldest son has passed away at 38 years of age from COVID-19
Michael Jai White is opening up about losing his eldest son to COVID-19.
The Black Dynamite star, 53, revealed during a recent interview with Vlad TV. that his 38-year-old son died “a few months ago” after being hospitalized.
“He was in the hospital for a while so it wasn’t immediate,” he told VladTV on Sunday of his son’s death.
White said that his son had been dealing with substance abuse for some time, and that it further “compromised” his health during his COVID-19 infection.
“Ultimately, when he got sick and went to the hospital, COVID was waiting for him… That was the knockout blow,” White said, adding that his son had not been vaccinated against the virus.
White’s oldest son was born when he was 15, and he told VladTV that they “grew up at the same time.”
“Unfortunately, he was still kinda out there in the streets hustling, wasn’t doing well, started getting on substances,” White said. “He’d come out, go back in, all that type of stuff.”
White said that while he tried to get his eldest, a father of six, help, “ultimately, it’s up to that person, especially if it’s a grown person.”
“He never shook the streets,” he said. “That was his thing.”
White also has a daughter named Morgan with Courtney Chatham, who he was married to from 2015 to 2011. He has been married to Gillian Iliana Waters since 2015, with who he has three children with.
White made history as the first Black actor to portray a superhero when he played Al Simmons in the 1997 film Spawn. He has over 100 film and TV credits to his name, including his portrayal of Mike Tyson in the 1995 HBO movie Tyson, the title character in 2009’s Black Dynamite and Bronze Tiger in the hit CW series Arrow.
