Silentó, the rapper best known for his viral 2015 hit “Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae),” has been sentenced to 30 years in prison after pleading guilty to charges related to the fatal shooting of his cousin.
The musician, whose real name is Ricky Lamar Hawk, pleaded guilty but mentally ill to charges relating to shooting Frederick Rooks in Jan. 2021. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the 27-year-old took a deal to plead guilty to a reduced charge from malice murder to voluntary manslaughter. He also pleaded guilty to aggravated assault, possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and concealing the death of another. A separate felony murder charge was dropped as part of the plea agreement.
Silentó will serve 30 years in prison with credit for time served since Feb. 2021.
The Atlanta rapper was initially arrested after the DeKalb County Police Department found Rooks, 34, with gunshot wounds to his face and leg in January 2021. Rooks was pronounced dead at the scene. Silentó confessed to the murder shortly after, and authorities matched bullet casings to a gun that he had at the time of his arrest.
Following Silentó’s arrest, his publicist at the time, Chanel Hudson, shared on social media that the rapper had been struggling with mental health issues. “Over the past several years, Ricky has been suffering immensely from a series of mental illnesses,” she wrote. “We will continue in his efforts of treatment, but we ask in the meantime the public uplift him and his family in immediate prayer & positive energy!!”
Silentó scored a massive hit with his debut single “Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae),” which he released as a junior in high school in 2015. The song was a runaway success, reaching No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and earning more than 400 million Spotify streams in the time since.
He shared his struggles with mental health in the years that followed, and Hudson claimed that he had attempted suicide in 2020. He had several encounters with law enforcement, including an arrest in Aug. 2020 for domestic violence. That October, he was arrested for driving 143 miles per hour in DeKalb County.
