Rapper Charged with Murder After Bragging About Homicide in Song
Police in Virginia believe they've solved a double-homicide case that went cold a few years back after a local rapper was found to have recorded a song in which he allegedly brags about committing the crime.
Antwain "Twain Gotti" Steward was arrested earlier this month and charged with killing Christopher Horton, 16, and Brian Dean, 20, in a gang-related shooting that occurred in May of 2007 on the front porch of Horton's Newport News home.
Four years after the case went cold, a Newport News Police detective followed a tip from two witnesses that led him to Steward's rap song "Ride Out," in which the 22-year-old appears to be boasting about murdering Horton.
From the song's lyrics:
Listen, walk to your boy and I approached him, 12 midnight on his traphouse porch and everybody saw when I fuckin choked him. But nobody saw when I fuckin smoked him, roped him, sharpened up the shank then I poked him, 357 Smith & Wesson [unintelligible] scoped him, roped him, had me crackin up so I joked him, it is betweezy six feet ova, told ya fuck with my money I'll roast ya.
According to WAVY, the song was first posted to Steward's MySpace page in 2009. It was uploaded to YouTube in 2011, but has since been removed.
Court documents show [pdf] that detectives believe Steward shot Horton after the two argued over an unknown matter earlier in the day.
At the time, Steward and two other individuals suspected of being involved in the shooting belonged to a street gang known as Wickzoo (since renamed MOR3SH3LLZ).
Horton was allegedly a member of a rival gang called the Dump Squad.
Don't believe that BS
— BEARTRAPPIN GOTTI (@TwainGotti) July 30, 2013
For his part, Steward denied the claims, urging his Twitter followers not to "believe that BS."
"S/o [shoutout] to everybody that's supporting thru this BS," the rapper tweeted. "Innocent is a fact!!!! Y'all know with love comes hate!!"
Horton's sister, meanwhile, is already convinced of Steward's guilt.
"He's basically a murderer in my eyes," she told News 10. "[A conviction] will help. It won't bring my brother back, but it will give some closure that we need right now."