The war in Jacksonville went viral last year
after rival rappers Yungeen Ace and Foolio took shots at each other’s dead homies
on Who I Smoke and the When I See U Remix.
But a lot has gone down behind the scenes since the beef first popped off.
Here’s what’s been going on.
Allegedly, one of Ace’s deadliest shooters
is a rapper named Ksoo.
He’s currently facing two 1st-degree murder charges,
and is a huge part of why the beef went viral in the first place.
Ksoo took the beef to the next level
when he allegedly murdered Foolio’s 16-year-old little brother Bibby.
In February 2019, Bibby was sitting outside his apartment with a friend
when a gunman walked up and started letting off shots.
Bibby and his homie split up and ran off,
but the shooter chased him down and lit him up.
Having your little brother die is tragic enough,
but Ksoo and Ace ain’t stop there.
Ace made Bibby and the whole beef famous when he dropped Who I Smoke.
He dissed Bibby and other dead KTA members,
then Ksoo dissed back on the track Ksoo *****.
Ksoo was already a suspect because of how much he dissed Bibby in music
and on social media, but before the cops had enough evidence to arrest him,
Ksoo allegedly caught another body with some help from his own dad.
Back in 2018, Ksoo’s brother Boss Goon was released from prison
after serving seven years on a burglary charge.
According to people close to him, he was trying to turn his life around
and make a career in music instead of the streets
- but tragedy struck just when he was getting started.
On January 16th, 2019,
Boss Goon performed at a club in Jacksonville.
His dad and a bunch of other relatives came through to support him,
and after the show they all loaded up in the same car.
But before they could get out, someone drove by and started letting off shots.
Everyone in the car got hit, and Boss Goon was tragically killed.
After he died, a KTA affiliate named Lil Buck
dropped a diss track aimed at Boss Goon.
This made Ksoo think Buck was involved in the murder,
so he crashed out and allegedly killed him in broad daylight –
then what happened next was like something straight out of a movie.
Ksoo and two other dudes allegedly ran up on Buck and shot him outside of a mall.
Then while one of them was still standing over his body,
the cops rolled in and chased after them.
Ksoo and the others took off,
but then they crashed their car in a residential neighborhood.
Ksoo ran off in one direction, while the other two
broke into a random house and took a woman hostage.
They stole some of her husband’s clothes,
then made a call to have someone come pick them up.
Ksoo managed to get away, but his homies were later identified
by the woman who they held hostage.
Their names are Dominique Barner and Leroy Whittaker,
and the woman was able to point one of them out in a lineup
after she recognized his tattoos.
Barner getting arrested was the worst case possible for Ksoo.
Barner told a police informant that Ksoo was the shooter,
then doubled down when they questioned him about it.
He also snitched on Ksoo’s dad
for picking him up from the house he broke into after the shooting.
Ksoo and his brother Abdul Robinson Jr.
were both indicted for second-degree murder -
but in 2022 the charges were upgraded to first-degree.
Ksoo’s time behind bars ain’t been easy.
In December 2021 he posted a video on Instagram
that shows prison guards allegedly body slamming him onto the ground.
He captioned the post with “MODERN SLAVERY !!!
Even Tho my Innocence is Being Proven,
I’m still being Targeted & abused everyday while I’m in here !
These officers still have not been suspended or no consequences !
I’m fighting for my Life Mentally and physically !!!
No matter what they do to me they can’t keep an innocent man down #FreeMe ‼️”
To top it all off, Ksoo got hit with another murder charge while he was in jail
for allegedly killing Bibby back in 2019.
After his charges were upgraded to first-degree murder,
Bibby’s mother told News 4 Jax:
“It was a relief because I was terrified the entire time.
It’s a relief because now I’ve got my faith in the court system.”
Ksoo’s legal team tried to get his $4 million bond reduced
after the charges were upgraded,
but then the judge decided that he can’t be bonded out at all.
It’s unclear why the charges were bumped up,
but the prosecution obviously thinks they got a strong case
if they willing to go to trial over it.
It’s harder to convict on a 1st-degree murder charge,
so they might have some solid evidence that the public don’t know about.
A trial date ain’t been set yet, but Bibby’s mom is ready for it all to end.
She told News 4 Jax:
“I just can’t wait until this trial is over with so we can finally start to heal
because none of us have healed yet.
None of us have begun to heal yet.”
Ksoo is facing life in prison if he’s convicted,
but he ain’t the only Jacksonville rapper with an open case right now.
In April 2022, his biggest opp Foolio got hit with a felony charge
for fleeing from the police.
On April 5th, 2022, the police tried to pull Foolio over
for his illegally tinted windows.
But instead of stopping right there,
Foolio drove another three blocks
while he and two other dudes in the car allegedly rummaged around
“as if they were attempting to conceal and/or retrieve illegal items.”
When he finally stopped, he told the cops there were two guns in the car,
but the cops only found one.
Right now Foolio’s on house arrest until his next court date,
but he’s been in the headlines like crazy for the past few months.
The war in Jacksonville really popped off
when the diss tracks Who I Smoke and When I See U Remix both went viral.
And back in October, Foolio doubled down on the disrespect with the track
List of Dead Opps, where he went after every single one of his dead enemies.
List of Dead Opps is one of the most disrespectful tracks ever.
There ain’t no hook, just one long verse
where Foolio goes in on 30 of his dead opps - including Yungeen Ace’s brother
and two friends who were murdered right next to him.
One month after he dropped the track, someone pulled up to the studio Foolio was at
and tried to kill him.
But he got away with nothing but a graze.
This latest charge don’t seem too serious,
but two of Foolio’s homies just found out
that they’re gonna be spending the next seven years in prison.
Y&R Mookey and Y&R Slugga Tee, AKA the Murda Twinz,
were both convicted of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
Everyone knows about Foolio's beef with Ace,
but rumors say the war between ATK and KTA
really started at a party when Yungeen Ace allegedly shot at Mookey.
Mookey and Slugga Tee both got arrested
during an investigation called Operation Rap Up.
The Jacksonville Sheriff’s office went after alleged gang members
who were using music videos and social media to promote violence,
and now the Murda Twinz are both gonna be off the streets for a minute.
Y&R took a major hit when Mookey and Slugga got locked up,
and to make matters worse, Mookey’s own homie Spotemgottem
was accused of snitching on him.
Yungeen Ace’s brother ATK Ybeezy
leaked paperwork that allegedly proved Spotemgottem worked with the cops,
but Mookey later said it was all cap.
Rumors about snitching can get you killed,
but that’s not the only problem Spotem is going through.
Back in July 2021, he allegedly pointed a gun at a parking attendant in Miami
and threatened him.
Then when the police showed up at his hotel room to arrest him,
they found him lying in bed with an AK-47.
Spotemgottem was hit with charges for aggravated assault with a firearm
and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon,
but the judge let him off easy with an $18,000 bond.
His charges are pretty serious, but it’s nothing compared to what happened next.
Two months after his arrest,
Spotem was driving down I-95 in Miami when another car pulled up next to him
and started dumping shots.
When it was over, the driver side was left with 22 bullet holes,
but luckily Spotemgottem was only hit in the hip.
A dude in the backseat was shot in the legs,
but both of them were taken to the hospital in stable condition.
No one has been arrested for the drive-by,
but rumors say it was ATK behind the hit.
Meanwhile, the crew’s most famous member ain’t even in Jacksonville no more.
In June 2021,
Yungeen Ace revealed during an interview with Houston radio DJ Ashlee Young
that he moved out of Jacksonville and now lives in Houston full time.
Getting out of the city that made him famous seems to be working out though.
Now that he’s away from the streets,
he’s been able to focus more on his music and career.
Ace told Ashlee Young “We don’t even go to clubs.
Everyday when we wake up, it’s ‘to the money."
But even though he’s not in Jacksonville no more,
he ain’t leaving his homies behind.
He’s always flying friends and new artists into Houston
to show them how to make it in the music industry,
because according to him the police don’t want him showing back up in Jacksonville.
It’s crazy that out of everyone involved in this wild beef,
Ace seems to be doing the best right now.
It all allegedly started with him,
but now he’s away from it all and just working on his craft.
In April 2022 he dropped his latest album with features from Kodak and Boosie,
and he also revealed that he’s friends with Vanessa Carlton now.
Vanessa Carlton is the artist behind A Thousand Miles,
which Ace sampled for the infamous Who I Smoke track.
A 2000’s pop singer linking up with one of the most savage drill rappers in the game
is a twist nobody saw coming,
but Ace says they’ve got even more music in the works right now.
The war in Jacksonville ain’t as hot right now as it was back in 2020,
but that don’t mean it’s over.
People are still getting shot and killed over the beef between ATK and KTA,
but a lot of their main shooters are either dead or fighting cases.
Back in November, Foolio said
he wasn’t going to diss dead opps in his music anymore,
but the beef is way deeper than rap at this point.
Both sides have lost a lot of people already,
and there’s little to no chance they’re gonna let it go.
The war might die down for a bit while everyone figures out their legal situations,
but one diss could restart the whole thing.
Hopefully some of the other dudes involved in the situation
will start moving smarter like Ace has and avoid any more street drama.
There’s talented artists on both sides who could make it out of the trenches
if they just focused on their careers,
but when you’re raised around crime and violence it’s tough to break out of the cycle.
Sometimes fans seem to forget that the dudes involved in these beefs
are real people with families who care about them.
Back in 2018, an 18-year-old named Corbin Johnson was reported missing by his mom.
His remains were found in the woods a year later, and his death was ruled as a murder.
In 2021, Foolio dissed Corbin on the track Beatbox remix/Bibby Flow.
He rapped “Corbin got kidnapped they found his bones he was rotten
(Where’s Corbin?)”
This lyric kicked off a massive TikTok trend
where people danced to the line about Corbin’s death,
and the hashtag #Where’sCorbin reached over three million views.
On the same track, Foolio also went after a 17-year-old named Prosper Love
who was murdered in 2014.
Prosper’s mom heard the song and decided she wasn’t going to take it.
She started a change.org petition to get violent rap music removed from social media -
and even started a nonprofit in her son’s honor called No Weapon Shall Prosper
to raise awareness about gun violence.
The war in Jacksonville has caused a lot of pain and suffering,
but hopefully now that Ace is in Texas
and Foolio is fighting his own case,
the violence in the streets will slow down at the least.
Most of these cases are still developing so tap in for updates.