Law enforcement officials have said Tekashi69 could enter the witness protection program after testifying against the Nine Trey Bloods gang. But the rapper has no plans to – in fact, he wants to make more music.
Tekashi 6ix9ine – real name Daniel Hernandez – entered into a guilty plea deal with prosecutors after being arrested in November last year.
He was facing a minimum of 47 years and maximum of life in prison after being charged with nine federal counts, including racketeering, firearms offences and drug trafficking. But in a bid to shorten his sentence, he’s testifying against members of the notorious gang.
There are fears for Tekashi’s safety when he gets out of prison – he hasn’t been sentenced yet, but he hopes it’ll be in 2020 – following his act of snitching.
The rapper who said in court: ‘I knew I was going to become a target. I knew they were going to try and hurt me,’ could enter the witness protection program, The New York Times reported over the weekend.
Jay Kramer, a former FBI official who worked on organised crime cases, said:
Despite how connected we are, and the appetite for social media content in this country, there are places where, if this kid gets a haircut and wears normal clothes, no one would know or care who he is.
However, according to TMZ, he’ll be rejecting the offer. Sources close to the rapper say he’ll forgo witness protection as he’s ‘itching’ to make new music.
As for his safety, Tekashi allegedly plans to have a 24/7 security team – living a life of fame will hiding in plain sight.
In the trial against Anthony ‘Harv’ Ellison and Aljermiah ‘Nuke’ Mack, for kidnapping, racketeering and narcotics trafficking, Tekashi turned on a number of people: including Cardi B and Diplomats artist Jim Jones.
Cardi B and her representatives denied the claims, explaining she was a member of a different group, the Brim Bloods, in her youth.
Snoop Dogg’s social media seems to be a fair indicator of how the hip-hop world is reacting to Tekashi’s testimony, with continuous trolling and criticism of the rapper.
In a recent post, Snoop compared Tekashi to Martha Stewart – the US TV personality who went to jail for five months in 2004 following an insider trading scandal.
Snoop and Stewart have been friends for years, collaborating on Martha & Snoop’s Potluck Dinner Party in 2016.
Snoop’s post read:
As we watch Tekashi69 (or whatever his name is) snitch on EVERYBODY, I invite you all to remember Martha Stewart snitched on NOT ONE soul during her trial.
Baby girl kept it 10 toes down and ate that prison sentence by herself, like the true baddie she is.
The trial, which has attracted worldwide media attention, wraps up today (September 26). Only time will tell what Tekashi’s sentence will be.
However, if he’s not going to take the Henry Hill route, life could get very dangerous, very quickly.
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After graduating from Glasgow Caledonian University with an NCTJ and BCTJ-accredited Multimedia Journalism degree, Cameron ventured into the world of print journalism at The National, while also working as a freelance film journalist on the side, becoming an accredited Rotten Tomatoes critic in the process. He’s now left his Scottish homelands and took up residence at UNILAD as a journalist.