Yahoo News Pop Smoke death: Five arrested over shooting of US rapper
Five suspects have been arrested in connection with the death of US rapper Pop Smoke.
Announcing the arrests on Thursday, the Los Angeles Police Department said three men and two "juvenile males" had been taken into custody over the case. The teenagers were aged 15 and 17.
Pop Smoke, real name Bashar Barakah Jackson, was killed in a suspected robbery in February at the age of 20.
Police had initially discounted a robbery theory in the days after the rapper’s death at a home in the Hollywood Hills, but now say evidence indicates that was in fact the case.
LAPD Detectives have arrested three adult males & two juvenile males related to the Feb 19th murder of Bashar Jackson, a New York based rapper known as Pop Smoke. We will provide further details as they become available.
— LAPD HQ (@LAPDHQ)
Captain Jonathan Tippet, who oversees the Los Angeles Police Department’s elite Robbery-Homicide Division, said three men and two teenage boys probably went to the home because they knew Pop Smoke was there from social media posts.
They stole items from the home, though Captain Tippet said he could not divulge what was taken.
“We believe that it was a robbery," he said.
“Initially we didn’t really have the evidence but then we discovered some other evidence that showed this was likely a home invasion gone bad."
The five suspects were arrested on Thursday morning as detectives served several search warrants in Los Angeles.
All are believed to be members of a South Los Angeles gang, which Mr Tippet would not name, and at least some of them are believed to be linked to the 2019 homicide of an 18-year-old man when a fight escalated into a shooting outside the Rose Bowl in Pasadena.
The three men were identified as Jaquan Murphy, 21, Corey Walker, 19, and Keandre D. Rodgers, 18, all of Los Angeles.
Walker and Rodgers were arrested on suspicion of murder, while Murphy was held on suspicion of attempted murder, police said.
The men were being held in lieu of $1 million bail apiece.
The 15-year-old and the 17-year-old also were also booked on suspicion of murder.
Pop Smoke and his entourage who were staying at the Hollywood Hills home are not believed to be associated with the gang, Captain Tippet said.
No one else was shot during the incident.
The Los Angeles Times reported in February that the rapper had posted pictures of himself posing by an infinity pool in the home’s back garden, as well as a picture of the Los Angeles skyline from what was probably the garden.
In another post, Pop Smoke or a member of his entourage put a picture of a gift bag tagged with the Hollywood Hills address and a different photo showed him posing by a Ranger Rover in a spot where the home’s address was partly visible in the background.
“It’s our belief that (the home-invasion robbery) was based on some of the social media posts," Captain Tippet said.
The home is owned by Edwin Arroyave and his wife Teddi Mellencamp, daughter of Rock & Roll Hall-of-Famer John Mellencamp and a star of The Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills.
Teddi Mellencamp previously said on Instagram that the couple had been notified of the shooting at their rental property but knew no more than what they had seen in media reports.
Pop Smoke arrived on the rap scene in 2018 and broke out with Welcome To The Party, a track featuring lyrics about shootings, killings and drugs that became a huge sensation, and prompted Nicki Minaj to record a verse on a remix.
Earlier this year, Pop Smoke released the mixtape Meet The Woo 2, which debuted at number seven on the Billboard Top 200 albums chart.
It was the follow-up to his first official release, Meet The Woo.
The rapper also had the popular hit Gatti with Travis Scott and Jackboys and Dior.
His major label debut album, Shoot For The Stars Aim For The Moon, was executive-produced by 50 Cent.
It was released posthumously last Friday to mostly positive reviews, and features appearances from popular artists including Future, DaBaby and Quavo.
