May 11, 2023

As The Rest of the Rappers comes to a close, I bring you the case of XXXTentacion. XXXTentacion was robbed, shot and killed on June 18, 2018 in the parking lot of a motorcycle dealership in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Currently there are four suspects who have been taken into custody as of August 2022. Out of the four suspects, one decided to plead guilty to second degree murder in exchange for testimony against the other three.

There have been many conspiracies surrounding this case since the trial began, mostly due to the fact that X was a well known celebrity. There may even be new witnesses to the murder, including rapper Drake, rapper Tekhashi 69, former rapper and media personality Joe Budden and finally the rap group Migos (excluding Takeoff due to his death in November 2022).

Drake is the only individual who was served a subpoena (a legal summons to appear in court). The subpoena was (most likely) served due to the beef that existed between Drake and X before the rapper’s untimely death. Back in 2017, one year before he passed, X made a social media post saying that if he were to get killed the perpetrator would be “Champagnepapi,” a.k.a. Drake’s instagram name. 

In 2017, Drake released a song that some listeners considered to be a retake of X’s song “Look at Me.” When X’s fans took their displeasure to twitter, Drake realized how the two songs could be seen as really similar. Well, X didn’t like that. He went on a twitter rant about the song, essentially slandering Drake, and also photoshopped the rapper doing something inappropriate. 

A few months after X was shot and killed in broad daylight, Drake released the song “Im Upset.” One of the lyrics said: “SMS, triple X, That’s the only time I ever shoot below the neck.” 

This lyric led many fans to believe that Drake may have had something to do with X’s death—or at the very least was throwing shade. Also, in another of his newer songs, Drake used his flow to suggest that if XXXTentacion had never dissed Drake then he would still be alive.

Update: As I completed this article it came to my attention that on March 20th, 2023 the three men, Trayvon Newsome (24), Michael Boatwright (28) and Derick Williams (26), were all found guilty of armed robbery and first degree murder in X’s death. They were all given a sentence of life in prison.