XXXTentacion Shot Dead at 20

Noah Yoo
Updated
Dedrick D. Williams has been arrested in connection with the 20-year-old rapper’s shooting

Jahseh Dwayne Onfroy, the rapper and singer known as XXXTentacion, has died, TMZ and the Blast report. Onfroy was 20 years old. According to TMZ, Onfroy was leaving a motorcycle dealership in South Florida this afternoon when a gunman ran up to his car and opened fire. The Broward County Sheriff's Department pronounced him dead at 5:40 p.m. Eastern time.

Jahseh Onfroy began recording music under the moniker XXXTentacion at the age of 16, releasing his first music onto SoundCloud in 2014. Collaborations with Ski Mask the Slump God and members of his collective Members Only would follow. He released what would become his breakout hit, “Look at Me!,” in December of 2015. In October the following year, he was arrested on charges of aggravated battery of a pregnant woman, domestic battery by strangulation, and false imprisonment.

“Look at Me!” gained further popularity and become a viral hit during Onfroy’s prison stint, leading him to sign a deal with EMPIRE weeks before he was released on probation. He was released from jail in March of 2016, after pleading no contest to charges of armed home invasion robbery and aggravated battery with a firearm and receiving a withheld conviction in addition to probation.

The summer after being released from prison, Onfroy embarked on (and subsequently cancelled) a tour behind his first commercial mixtape, Revenge. A proper studio album, 17, would follow in in August. Not long afterward, it was revealed in documents from Onfroy’s ongoing criminal trial that the alleged victim accused him of various heinous acts, including severe physical abuse. He was also facing witness harassment and tampering charges at the time of his death.

Earlier this year, Spotify removed Onfroy’s music from its editorial and algorithmic playlists as part of its Hate Content & Hateful Conduct policy, which aimed to promote “openness, diversity, tolerance and respect.” The next month, the service restored his music to some of its biggest playlists after walking back the policy, including adding his single “SAD!” to RapCaviar. Top Dawg Entertainment CEO Anthony “Top Dawg” Tiffith said that he even called Spotify’s Daniel Ek, threatening to remove his artists’ music from Spotify if the policy were to have remained intact.

XXXTentacion’s second studio album, ?, was released this past March and debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart.