Up-and-coming rapper Smoke Dawg was shot and killed Saturday in what’s been described as a brazen daylight attack in Toronto’s busy Entertainment District — making him the third young rapper to die in gun violence in June.
Associates of Smoke Dawg, including friend and collaborator Drake, confirmed on social media that the 21-year-old Toronto native was the young man killed outside a nightclub just before 8 p.m. Saturday, as that city’s streets were filled with people enjoying Canada Day weekend festivities
His death follows those of rising megastar XXXTentacion, 20, in Florida and Jimmy Wopo, 21, in Pittsburgh — both on June 18.
“This has been a summer full of tragedy, with rap artists who had a lifetime of potential having their lives cruelly taken away from them,” notes the site hotnewhiphop.com.
Drake added to that sense of devastation among the hip-hop community by sharing an emotional message about Dawg, a fellow Toronto native, in an Instagram Story. Dawg had been his opening act on his Boy Meets World European tour.
“All these gifts and blessed souls and inner lights being extinguished lately is devastating,” Drake wrote. “I wish peace would wash over our city. So much talent and so many stories we never get to see play out. Rest up Smoke.”
But it’s been a violent month in other ways in the rap community, with shots fired in the proximity of rapper Chief Keef, 22, in Times Square in early June, and Rich the Kidd, 25, landing in the hospital after being attacked and robbed at gunpoint in a home invasion robbery in his girlfriend’s Los Angeles home. Trippie Redd, 19, also was arrested in Atlanta in connection with a woman’s claim he pistol-whipped her, TMZ reported.
Dawg, born Jahvante Smart and a member of the Halal Gang, was an up-and-coming artist in a city whose rap scene continues to gain prominence, hotnewhiphop.com reported. Dawg had dropped a new song this week, “Fountain Freestyle,” after first gaining attention for the song “Still” and for performing with Drake. He was working on his debut album.
Dawg was one of three people shot in the area of Queen Street West and Peter Street in Toronto, according to CP24 News. Shots rang out shortly before 8 p.m., with two males and one female transported to a local hospital. The male victims both suffered life-threatening injuries, globalnews.ca added. One died Saturday night and the other succumbed early Sunday morning. Police told CP24 News that the suspects may have fled in a black SUV or a white car.
Witnesses described a “chaotic scene,” with one man telling CP24 News: “We heard multiple, multiple gunshots. They came in two sets. … The scene just turned chaotic. There were people running everywhere, there were vehicles just trying to get out of the way. Down on Peter Street we just saw a mass of tourists – normal Saturday traffic on Queen Street – basically running scared for their lives. It was intense, it was very chaotic.”
Dawg’s killing follows an emotional week for rap fans, in which thousands paid their respects for XXXTentacion at an open-casket viewing of his body at a Florida sports complex Thursday. XXXTentacion was shot and killed in an apparent robbery outside a Deerfield, Florida, motorcycle shop.
XXXTentacion’s song “SAD!,” originally released several months ago, skyrocketed to no. 1 on the Billboard Top 100, after sitting at no. 52 the previous week. Fans also clamored to watch the new music video for “SAD!” which was released Friday and shows, among other things, XXXTentacion attending a dramatization of his own funeral.
Federal investigators are helping Florida sheriff’s deputies search for additional suspects in XXXTentacion’s killing. A Florida man is currently being held in Broward County Jail, charged with first degree murder without premeditation.
In this Feb. 27, 2017 photo, hip-hop artist Jimmy Wopo poses in Pittsburgh, Pa. Wopo, an up-and-coming rapper, was shot and killed and another man was injured Monday, June 18, 2018, in Pittsburgh, when someone opened fire on their car, police said. The 21-year-old musician, whose real name was Travon Smart, had multiple videos that surpassed 1 million views on YouTube, including "Elm Street" and "First Day Out." (Stephanie Strasburg/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via AP)
Hip-hop artist Jimmy Wopo. (Stephanie Strasburg/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via AP)
But XXXTentacion, who was born Jahseh Onfroy, was well known for his own history of violence, including an arrest for allegedly beating an ex-girlfriend who was pregnant at the time and his admission that he beat a fellow juvenile-detention inmate nearly to death for looking at him with “perceived same-sex lust,” according to Slate.
Meanwhile, police are still investigating the killing of Wopo, who suffered fatal injuries when a gunman opened fire on his vehicle in Pittsburgh’s Hill District. Funeral services were held Friday in Pittsburgh for Wopo, who was born Travon Smart and who was about to sign a record contract with Wiz Khalifa’s Atlantic-affiliated label, according to the Pittsburgh Post Gazette.
Violence has long been a subject and hazard of rap music, with at least 30 rappers killed since the late 1980s, most famously Tupac Shakur in 1996 and the Notorious B.I.G. in 1997. But according to reports, the deaths of XXXTentacion, Jimmy Wopo and Smoke Dawg appear to constitute an unusual string of killings within such a short period of time.
The recent violence has prompted some rappers to reconsider their pattern of online feuding with other artists. For example, XXXTentacion’s death apparently prompted flamboyantly abrasive Brooklyn rapper Tekashi 6ix9ine to think he needed to stop trolling others online. Currently, the 22-year-old Tekashi is under investigation for possible involvement in the June 2 shooting at Chief Keef, with whom he had been feuding.
This story has been updated to include information about the death of a second man in Saturday night’s shooting in Toronto.
