However, Knight knew her legal rights and vowed to continue fighting for her son. “The only weapon he tries to use that he knows means anything to me is Shanga…”īarry Hankerson and Gladys Knight with a baby in a scene from the film “Pipe Dreams,” in 1976. Batling with her ex-husband in court proved costly for the artist, but when it was over, she said: The songstress was relieved when Shanga was finally returned to her she’d received papers showing that she had custody. However, the boy’s father kept him away from Knight for nearly six months! During their marriage, the second for both, the couple welcomed a son, while Barry also already had one other child from his previous union.Īfter the divorce from Barry, their son, Shanga Ali, was allowed to visit his father for five days starting from Thanksgiving. Without wasting time, when Knight’s first marriage ended, she married Barry in September 1974. Knight met Barry Hankerson in 1971 when he asked the former’s group, Gladys Knight and the Pips, to perform at a charity Detroit telethon to raise money for sickle cell anemia. While married, the former couple first welcomed a son and then a daughter. Part of the divorce agreement was that Knight would get custody of the couple’s two children. | Source: Getty ImagesĪt the time of the divorce, the famous singer and Newman II had been separated for seven years. Gladys Knight and Barry Hankerson in a scene from the film “Pipe Dreams,” in 1976. The pair tied the knot in 1962 before Knight filed for an uncontested divorce, which was granted in January 1973. Her first marriage was to fellow musician James G. She thought they never waited around backstage or tried to outsmart her band to get closer to her. However, he wouldn’t end things peacefully and tried using the singer’s son against her.īefore Gladys Knight got married, she believed that being in the public eye was one of the reasons eligible men didn’t approach her. Knight won a legal battle to sever ties to the business in 2017, and her son was ordered to stop using her name, likeness and memorabilia, according to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.Gladys Knight’s second husband was the one to file for divorce when their marriage crumbled. “Paying taxes is a way to give back to the community, but unfortunately Hankerson chose to use those funds for other means.” “While ownership of a well-known restaurant in our community has its perks, it also comes with great responsibility,” IRS Criminal Investigation Special Agent in Charge James Dorsey said. From at least 2012 to 2016, Hankerson failed to remit more than $1 million in payroll taxes, prosecutors said. He was the sole owner of the business and was required to withhold payroll taxes from his employees’ gross pay. During his sentencing Wednesday, Hankerson, who pleaded guilty in July, was also ordered to serve a year of supervised release following his prison sentence and to pay more than $1 million in restitution. Attorney Kurt Erskine said in a news release.

Hankerson, 45, “willfully disregarded his tax obligations for many years,” Acting U.S. Over the next several years, he opened at least three more locations in Georgia and Washington, D.C. Shanga Hankerson opened his first restaurant, Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles, in Atlanta in 1997. The son of R&B legend Gladys Knight has been sentenced to serve two years in prison for failing to withhold payroll taxes for the restaurants that bore his mother’s name, federal prosecutors in Atlanta said.

Gladys knight son