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Rapper YG’s home searched in connection with murder investigation

Posted at 3:38 PM, Jul 18, 2019
and last updated 2019-07-18 23:21:08-04

Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies searched the Hollywood Hills home of rapper YG in connection with a deputy-involved shooting that caused a bystander’s death, authorities said Thursday.

YG, whose name is Keenon Jackson, was not at the home when the warrant was executed but several people were detained, the sheriff’s office said. One person, 29-year-old Tyquan Williams, was arrested on a weapons charge, the sherrif’s office said. He is being held on $25,000 bail.

There is no warrant for the rapper’s arrest, authorities said.

A 2018 black Cadillac Escalade registered to the rapper was chased by deputies and shots were fired from the vehicle on July 3 in Compton, according to the sheriff’s office. A man was found dead on a street corner after the chase, authorities said.

Two days after the shooting, YG posted on social media: “I was nowhere near the scene of this incident, I was in Hollywood recording in the studio all day. I was there until after midnight on the 4th of July and didn’t learn of these events until after they happened!”

The rapper’s representatives did not respond to a CNN request for comment on Thursday.

“Detectives are exhausting all investigative efforts to the tragic incident in which 65-year-old Ricky Starks was killed,” the sherrif’s office said.

Before the shooting, deputies pursued a driver suspected of reckless driving and driving under the influence, the sheriff’s office said in an earlier new release.

Authorities said someone in “the pursued black Cadillac Escalade opened fire on the deputies with a high power assault rifle.”

A second deputy-involved shooting occurred at another point during the pursuit, the sheriff’s office said.

A suspect in the passenger side of the Escalade “fired several shots” at a sheriff’s department helicopter, which was also following the SUV, the sheriff’s office said.

The suspects abandoned the Escalade and ran away.

One person was taken into custody. Authorities are searching for at least one more suspect. A weapon was not recovered from the Escalade.

Starks was found at the street corner with multiple gunshot wounds. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

It was unknown if Starks was shot by the suspect in the fleeing Escalade or caught in the crossfire from the deputy-involved shooting, the sheriff’s office said.

YG became an outspoken critic of then-Republican Presidential candidate Donald Trump in 2016. In the lead-up to his second studio album, “Still Brazy,” the California rapper dropped a single called “FDT,” a song whose title is made up of the GOP nominee’s initials and an expletive.

The Compton rapper also recorded with the late Nipsey Hussle, who was killed in April.