Rapper Nuke Bizzle Goes To Jail For Shizzle.
The rapper, whose real name is Fontrell Antonio Baines, 33, agreed to plead guilty to federal fraud and firearms charges after he bragged in a YouTube music video that he got rich by robbing unemployment funds COVID-19, prosecutors said Wednesday.
He will face a maximum of 30 years behind bars on one count of mail fraud and one count of unlawful possession of a firearm and ammunition when he pleads guilty in a Los Angeles court, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California said in a statement for news.
The Memphis rapper admitted to making 92 false claims using associates’ names totaling $1.2 million through the California Department of Employment Development. The not-so-disguised musician then made a music video for a song called “EDD” where he held up a stack of EDD envelopes that apparently contained government debit cards.
“Unemployment is so sweet. We had 1.5 lands this week,” Baines raps in the video. Another voice adds, “You have to sell cocaine, I can just file a lawsuit.”
Baines admitted in his plea that between July and September 2020 he received unemployment insurance money distributed under the pandemic unemployment assistance provisions of the federal CARES Act. He allegedly used addresses in Beverly Hills and Koreatown where he was then able to obtain debit cards from which to later withdraw cash.
As part of his plea, he agreed to forfeit $57,750 that was seized by cops when he was arrested in October 2020.
He was caught at a Hollywood Hills residence with a semi-automatic handgun and 14 rounds of ammunition that he was prohibited from possessing because of previous felony convictions, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.
Baines has been in jail since his arrest in 2020, prosecutors said.
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