A man has been arrested in Georgia over the killing of a young rapper who was gunned down several years ago in a different state, as a result of a music video beef.
Ronell Scott, 25, was charged with murder over the death of 20-year-old TreShawn Smith in October 2022, in Ohio, with a warrant put out for his arrest last April.
Investigators said previously that Smith had been fatally shot over a music video he had posted previously. The video had been one of several made between two groups “disrespecting” each other.
“Just knowing that a person has been indicted, that means the detectives, the prosecutors cared enough to seek justice for my son,” Smith’s mother, Evvie Smith, told FOX19 NOW on Thursday.
Smith was reportedly hanging out with friends at a fountain on Elm Street, in Lockland, Ohio, when Scott drove by and shot him in the head before fleeing the scene.
According to his mother, Smith had made his rap video well before the feud between the groups had started.
“It wasn’t to be taken personal, and I think that it was just taken personal,” she said. “Why not just come back with another rap lyric because you didn’t like the way somebody rap. Just make another song. It’s just a song.”
Smith was killed two weeks before his 21st birthday and had aspirations of being a firefighter. “TreShawn was not only my child, he was my friend,” his mother told FOX19 at the time.
However, she said previously that she did not want “street justice” for her son’s killer and that she had decided to forgive Scott for his crime.
“All I want is for the person who did this to my son to be brought to justice. This is the only thing that I want,” she said.
“I had to forgive. I can’t have that burden on my heart. I cannot sit around here and have hatred in my heart for nobody.”
Scott was booked into the Hamilton County Jail on Monday and is being held on a $500,000 bond. He has also been charged with aggravated murder and felonious assault over the shooting.
If convicted on all charges, he faces life in prison.
