Aspiring Ottawa rapper Shylock (aka Malik Adjokatcher) was killed in his notorious Ritchie St. neighborhood this past Tuesday in what police have called a gang related attack. The 24-year-old artist was well known in his West end Ottawa community and was actively promoting his Ladder to Success 101: Watch Your Step mixtape. In the past few years Shylock had released several promotional videos and collaborated with several other local artists.
There has been a strong show of mourning for the loss of Shylock through social media and today several friends tweeted from both his wake and funeral on the importance of being there for their friend: “wake and funeral not exactly how I planned to spend my birthday but paying my respect and going to support a friend R.I.P Shylock,” wrote one supporter on Twitter. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the Adjokatcher family and friends. R.I.P. Malik “Shylock” Adjokatcher.
Click here to check out some of Shylock’s more recent work.
Ottawa rapper gunned down in west end rowhouse
“I’ll see you later.”
Those were the last words 24-year-old Malik Adjokatcher said to his mother the day before he was gunned down at a Britannia housing complex on Wednesday.
The aspiring rap artist had promised her when he hit it big, he’d whisk her away to a better life.
“Every time I’m sad, he sees me and says, ‘mom, don’t be sad, everything will be OK,’” said his distraught mother at the Bayshore apartment she shared with him.
“He said, ‘one day, I’ll get you out of here.’”
But Adjokatcher, who had four brothers, loved basketball, posted rap videos and made his own C.D., became the city’s fifth homicide victim this year as shots rang out around midnight along Ritchie St, an area known for its gang activity.
“He’s my son. He’s not in a gang. He’s a rapper,” said his mother, surrounded by family friends who echoed the same.
But a friend of Adjokatcher’s — who went by the street name “Shylock,” — believes the killing was gang-related, and thought to be over a drug debt.
He also said his friend, who didn’t want his name used, was “a great guy” and had “a good heart,” but may have crossed paths with the wrong people.
“I told him, ‘if you start hanging out here, you’re going to get killed,’” said the friend, who was not surprised at the shooting. “It was about time something like that transpired.”
Adjokatcher, whose online hiphop videos show the Ritchie St. area where he was killed, had a history of violence and was known to police.
He was sentenced to 835 days in jail stemming from a 2008 incident where he’d been originally charged with attempted murder but pleaded to aggravated assault.
It is not unusual to see police along Ritchie St., where officers swarmed early Wednesday.
Neighbours said Adjokatcher was brought out from unit 3 at 119 Ritchie St, where a woman and several children lived.
James Larabie, who was staying nearby, said the shots sounded like “chip bags popping.”
He ran outside and filmed video with his phone. Several people were taken away in cruisers, said Larabie.
“I seen a body laying in the back of an ambulance,” said Larabie.
Police said the shooting is similar to the unsolved homicide of 22-year-old Levy Kasende, who was gunned down outside an east end housing complex in Aug. 2012.
“The similarities are that the victim was known to police, it’s a shooting death in a densely populated area,” said Ottawa police Insp. John Maxwell.
“Police are concerned about innocent victims (possibly being caught in a crossfire).”
Police combed the grassy area of the complex with metal detectors, while forensic identification investigators could be seen going in and out of the unit.
Police had not made an arrest Wednesday night.
Source: Ottawa Sun
Aspiring rap artist gunned down in west-side Ottawa housing complex
A 24-year-old aspiring rap artist who wears the colours of the Bloods street gang in music videos was gunned down outside a west-end home late Tuesday.
Police and paramedics were called to an Ottawa Community Housing complex at 119 Ritchie St., north of Carling Avenue and west of Britannia Park, after neighbours heard three gunshots shortly before midnight.
Ottawa police were the first on the scene and attempted cardiopulmonary resuscitation until paramedics arrived. Paramedics say the man had serious wounds and no vital signs. He was pronounced dead in hospital.
Police have identified Ottawa’s fifth homicide victim of the year as 24-year-old Malik Adjokatcher. By late Tuesday, no arrests had been made in Adjokatcher’s death.
Sources say Adjokatcher was a member of the Ritchie Ramsey crew and was known by the street name Shylock.
Family and friends gathered at Adjokatcher’s mother’s Bayshore area apartment on Wednesday, stunned by the news of his death.
Adjokatcher’s mother, who didn’t give her name, said her son was a rap artist who made a CD with dreams of becoming famous.
Adjokatcher told his mother two days ago that he would take care of her when his rapping career got off the ground.
“One day, I will get you out of here,” Adjokatcher’s mother recalled her son said.
Adjokatcher’s mother said she last saw her son on Tuesday. He did pushups, took a shower and left after he said, “I’ll see you later.”
She said her son, one of five siblings, was not a gang member. Others at the Bayshore area apartment rejected police allegations that Adjokatcher was a gang member.
“He was a good son,” Adjokatcher’s mother said through tears.
Adjokatcher’s lawyer, Doug Baum, said police have repeatedly alleged his client was part of a gang, although he adamantly denied that he was a Blood member.
Baum said his client has never been charged or convicted of being part of a criminal organization.
Police sources say Adjokatcher meets the criteria developed by the Criminal Intelligence Service of Canada in 1991 to be labelled a gang member.
Videos on posted on YouTube show he and other known gang members were dressed in red clothing and bandanas — the colour worn by Blood street gang members — in videos that referred to drugs and guns.
Several comments were posted under the videos, such as “Ramsey in the house” and references to the “west-end projects.”
One of the videos was filmed in the area near the shooting scene on Ritchie Street.
In a song called Lights On, several young men were drinking in a stretch limo.
“Everyday I wake up it’s a — blessing,” Adjokatcher sang in one of the videos.
Another video produced by Hood Soldiers Records and posted on YouTube in August 2011 shows “Shylock” wearing a red T-shirt and baseball hat with a red do-rag underneath and holding a red handkerchief in his hand.
“I’m from the west so I got red on me like Michael,” he said, referring to the colour of Michael Jordan’s jersey when the National Basketball Association superstar played for the Chicago Bulls.
According to court records, Adjokatcher faced firearms charges last year along with five men after a gun was found in a car he was in during a traffic stop.
Adjokatcher was acquitted on all of the charges in December.
In 2009, he was charged with charged with attempted murder but pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of aggravated assault.
In March 2008, Adjokatcher was convicted of drug possession.
On Ritchie Street early Wednesday, neighbours were stunned to wake up to police guarding a homicide scene as forensic identification officers looked for any evidence that could lead police to a suspect.
Some children stopped to look at the crime scene before they boarded a bus to go to school.
Others who stopped by weren’t surprised about the violence on their street.
Marwa Elhakim, 19, said she heard three gunshots and saw three people running away, yelling, “The cops are coming.”
Terry Kloban was at home across the street from the scene when he heard what he thought was fireworks go off three times shortly after midnight.
Kloban said he heard a man screaming at someone to get away, then heard a man yell, “God, no.”
“It was dead quiet and the next thing there was ambulance and police coming down,” he said.
A woman who declined to give her name said she was glad she was moving soon and did the sign of the cross when she found out a man had been killed.
Many neighbours say the area is plagued with gang activity and drug use.
Elhakim says she’s afraid to walk on Ritchie Street, especially at night when the same group of men are outside drinking and doing drugs.
“It’s Ritchie,” she said. “You can’t do anything.”
Kloban said people “come out of the woodwork” every night in the area.
A man who didn’t want his named used said he was disgusted with the violence in the neighbourhood.
“Daytime arises and everybody just disappears,” he said. “Night time shows up, here comes all the zombies.”
He said he lost his own son to violence, but wouldn’t elaborate.
Source: The Ottawa Citizen
Homicide victim served jail time for 2008 stabbing
Ottawa police are investigating the city’s fifth homicide of the year after 24-year-old Malik Adjokatcher was fatally shot outside of a home west of Britannia Park.
Police said they were called to a house in the 100-block of Ritchie Street just before midnight. Neighbours said they heard three shots fired.
Adjokatcher was shot in the chest, police sources told CBC News.
The shooting happened outside and the victim fled into a nearby home, where he died despite the efforts of a responding officer to resuscitate him using CPR, sources said.
He was known to police and was involved in gang activity, sources said.
Adjokatcher pleaded guilty to aggravated assault in 2009 and was sentenced to more than two years in jail after a stabbing in 2008. He had originally been charged with attempted murder, but pleaded guilty to the lesser charge.
He was also convicted of drug and breach of probation charges in 2008. Last year he was acquitted of a weapons charge.
Neighbour wants cameras in the area
Terry Klovin said he’s lived on Ritchie Street for 30 years.
“After 9 (p.m.), one has to be fairly careful along here,” he said. “These characters, every other night they come out of the woodwork.”
Shane Whelan, whose father lives next door to the home, said the street has problems with drugs and violence.
Whelan said he was once attacked for refusing to hand over cigarettes.
“They started rushing me, grabbed me, smacked me over the head with a golf club,” he said. “My girlfriend said that they stopped because they thought I was dead.”
His father Matthew Whelan said he’s scared for his own life after seeing his son almost lose his.
“I think they should put up a couple of cameras,” he said, referring to the fact there are none in the housing complex.
“Even if people think it’s an invasion of privacy, it’s not … the neighbourhood’s getting a bad name.”
Investigating links to 2012 shooting
Ottawa police said they’re looking into possible links between Adjokatcher’s death and the drive-by shooting which killed Levy Kasende in August 2012.
Kasende was inside his ex-girlfriend’s house in east Ottawa when he got a phone call, stepped outside and was shot dead.
Sources tell CBC News that Kasende and Adjokatcher ran in the same social circles.
Police said they’re still looking for the gun and hoping to find witnesses who are willing to talk.
Police are asking anyone with information to call the major crime unit at 613-236-1222, ext. 5493, or Crime Stoppers at 613-233-8477 (TIPS) — toll free at 1-800-222-8477.
Source: CBC
