ATLANTA — Grammy-winning Atlanta rapper Young Thug has been arrested and booked into the Fulton County Jail on gang-related charges, online jail records show.
Jeffery Lamar Williams, 30, better known as Young Thug, was booked into jail Monday on two separate counts, according to jail records. He is charged with conspiracy to violate the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act and participation in street gang activity.
Williams’ RICO Act charge stems from an alleged offense in January 2013, while the gang activity charge is related to allegations from May 2018, jail records show.
The influential rapper was taken into custody by Atlanta police, but the department has not shared any information about the arrest. A police spokeswoman directed inquiries to the Fulton County district attorney’s office.
The Fulton DA’s office has not responded to requests for further information from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
According to Atlanta's WSB-TV, the indictment includes 56 counts centered on associates of Williams’ YSL record label. Williams’ first court appearance is scheduled for Tuesday morning, WSB reported.
The arrest is not Williams’ first encounter with law enforcement in metro Atlanta. In 2017, he was arrested on drug charges in DeKalb County alongside two other men, Chris Jones and Sergio “Gunna” Kitchens, the AJC reported. Kitchens, a well-known rapper in his own right, was an artist on Williams’ Smyrna-based YSL label.
Earlier that year, Williams was featured on Camila Cabello’s hit song “Havana,” the rapper’s first song to rise to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Williams has also been previously arrested in Fulton on drug charges, jail records show.
In the years since his last arrest, Williams’ star has grown as he avoided legal entanglements. In 2019, he won a Grammy Award as a songwriter on “This Is America,” the thought-provoking Childish Gambino track further propelled by an unconventional music video that went viral. Childish Gambino is the stage name of Donald Glover, the multifaceted actor and rapper known for producing and starring in the TV show “Atlanta.”
Williams has also been featured on two other songs that topped the Billboard charts, first on Travis Scott’s song “Franchise” in 2020 and again the next year on Drake’s “Way 2 Sexy,” which also featured Future, another Atlanta rapper.
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