WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.660 And that is the thing that keeps you up at night, 00:00:02.720 --> 00:00:05.320 right? The idea that art can be a mirror. But, 00:00:05.400 --> 00:00:07.679 you know, sometimes it's a confection. We usually 00:00:07.679 --> 00:00:09.619 think of artists as storytellers, people who 00:00:09.619 --> 00:00:12.119 invent worlds, who create characters. But what 00:00:12.119 --> 00:00:14.199 happens when the storyteller is narrating a crime 00:00:14.199 --> 00:00:17.679 scene in real time? And not only that, but set 00:00:17.679 --> 00:00:21.100 to a piano melody that is so beautiful, so, so 00:00:21.100 --> 00:00:23.859 soulful, it almost makes you forget what you're 00:00:23.859 --> 00:00:26.160 actually listening to. It is the ultimate dissonance, 00:00:26.239 --> 00:00:28.440 isn't it? You are tapping your foot to a confession, 00:00:28.620 --> 00:00:30.280 or at least what the state of Florida firmly 00:00:30.280 --> 00:00:34.240 believes is a confession. Exactly. Welcome back 00:00:34.240 --> 00:00:38.420 to The Deep Dive. It is February 6th, 2026. Today, 00:00:38.619 --> 00:00:40.759 we are opening a file that feels like it has 00:00:40.759 --> 00:00:43.219 been sitting on the desk for a decade. We are 00:00:43.219 --> 00:00:45.119 looking at a story that sits right at the intersection 00:00:45.119 --> 00:00:49.119 of musical genius, extreme poverty, what seem 00:00:49.119 --> 00:00:51.799 to be severe mental health struggles, and just 00:00:51.799 --> 00:00:53.799 brutal cold -blooded violence. We are talking, 00:00:53.820 --> 00:00:56.140 of course, about Jamel Maurice's Demons. The 00:00:56.140 --> 00:00:58.960 world knows him for better or for worse as YNW 00:00:58.960 --> 00:01:01.399 Melly. And the context here is absolutely wild. 00:01:01.520 --> 00:01:03.899 We were sitting here in 2026. This guy has been 00:01:03.899 --> 00:01:06.780 locked up since February 2019. We are talking 00:01:06.780 --> 00:01:10.900 seven years, his entire early 20s, spent in a 00:01:10.900 --> 00:01:13.620 cell without a final resolution and the latest 00:01:13.620 --> 00:01:16.579 update. The retrial isn't even on the docket 00:01:16.579 --> 00:01:19.939 until January 2027. It's a legal black hole. 00:01:20.269 --> 00:01:23.849 It is unprecedented in many ways for a high profile 00:01:23.849 --> 00:01:27.030 capital case to drag on this long without a final 00:01:27.030 --> 00:01:29.650 verdict. It's just it doesn't happen. So here 00:01:29.650 --> 00:01:32.530 is our mission today. We have a mountain of sources 00:01:32.530 --> 00:01:34.430 here. Court transcripts, ballistics reports, 00:01:34.709 --> 00:01:37.230 psychological evaluations, appellate court filings 00:01:37.230 --> 00:01:39.689 and a discography that is frankly haunting to 00:01:39.689 --> 00:01:41.890 listen back to now. It really is. We aren't just 00:01:41.890 --> 00:01:43.670 doing a biography. We really need to try and 00:01:43.670 --> 00:01:46.480 answer two specific questions. One. How does 00:01:46.480 --> 00:01:48.859 a kid go from a Kanye West collaboration to facing 00:01:48.859 --> 00:01:50.700 the death penalty in the span of, what, six months? 00:01:50.879 --> 00:01:53.579 And two, and this is the big one for me, is the 00:01:53.579 --> 00:01:56.680 Melvin persona, this violent alter ego he claims 00:01:56.680 --> 00:01:59.299 to have. Is it a legitimate mental health crisis 00:01:59.299 --> 00:02:01.459 or is it the most convenient legal defense ever 00:02:01.459 --> 00:02:03.579 invented? Right. Was it a cry for help or was 00:02:03.579 --> 00:02:05.719 it premeditation of a different kind? To even 00:02:05.719 --> 00:02:08.479 begin to answer that, you have to peel back the 00:02:08.479 --> 00:02:11.300 layers of the Y &W collective. Because this wasn't 00:02:11.300 --> 00:02:13.819 just a rap group. This was a brotherhood forged 00:02:13.819 --> 00:02:17.139 in a very specific, and I would argue, a very 00:02:17.139 --> 00:02:19.680 dangerous fire. Let's start with the soil then. 00:02:19.960 --> 00:02:22.020 You can't understand the fruit without looking 00:02:22.020 --> 00:02:24.840 at the roots. Where does Jamil Demons come from? 00:02:25.520 --> 00:02:28.919 Because Florida Man is a meme, but the reality 00:02:28.919 --> 00:02:31.729 of his upbringing is so far from funny. He comes 00:02:31.729 --> 00:02:34.169 from Gifford, Florida. And I think for listeners 00:02:34.169 --> 00:02:36.650 who aren't familiar with Florida geography, it 00:02:36.650 --> 00:02:38.810 is so important to distinguish Gifford from the 00:02:38.810 --> 00:02:41.030 tourist brochures. Right. This is not South Beach. 00:02:41.169 --> 00:02:43.629 No, this isn't Miami Beach. This isn't the theme 00:02:43.629 --> 00:02:47.009 parks of Orlando. Gifford is a small, unincorporated 00:02:47.009 --> 00:02:49.889 community in Indian River County. Historically, 00:02:49.889 --> 00:02:52.069 it has been marginalized, economically depressed, 00:02:52.169 --> 00:02:55.849 and really plagued by systemic issues for generations. 00:02:56.050 --> 00:02:58.319 It's one of those places where... Opportunity 00:02:58.319 --> 00:02:59.900 doesn't just knock on the door. You have to kick 00:02:59.900 --> 00:03:02.080 the door down just to find it. Precisely. And 00:03:02.080 --> 00:03:04.039 his entry into the world wasn't exactly stable. 00:03:04.319 --> 00:03:08.139 He was born on May 1st, 1999. His mother, Jamie 00:03:08.139 --> 00:03:11.879 Demon's King, was 14 years old. 14. I mean, just 00:03:11.879 --> 00:03:14.500 pause on that for a second. She is a child raising 00:03:14.500 --> 00:03:16.759 a child. She should be worrying about eighth 00:03:16.759 --> 00:03:18.960 grade algebra, not, you know, raising a son. 00:03:19.039 --> 00:03:21.060 She was in the ninth grade. And that dynamic 00:03:21.060 --> 00:03:24.020 is absolutely crucial to understanding him. They 00:03:24.020 --> 00:03:26.699 essentially grew up together. There wasn't a 00:03:26.699 --> 00:03:28.800 generational gap in the traditional sense. They 00:03:28.800 --> 00:03:31.280 were more like peers in a constant struggle for 00:03:31.280 --> 00:03:34.400 survival. He grew up without his biological father. 00:03:34.539 --> 00:03:36.879 Though later, a rapper named Dante Thaw gift, 00:03:37.099 --> 00:03:41.000 Taylor claimed paternity. But functionally, Mellie 00:03:41.000 --> 00:03:43.159 was raised by a single mother who was struggling 00:03:43.159 --> 00:03:45.319 to pay for housing, struggling to keep the lights 00:03:45.319 --> 00:03:47.639 on, moving from place to place in the poorer 00:03:47.639 --> 00:03:49.939 sectors of the county. And in that kind of vacuum, 00:03:50.180 --> 00:03:53.080 you know, no father figure, extreme poverty, 00:03:53.240 --> 00:03:55.599 a mother who is practically a sister in age, 00:03:55.759 --> 00:03:58.560 something else usually fills the void. Streets 00:03:58.560 --> 00:04:00.539 fill the void. We know from his biographical 00:04:00.539 --> 00:04:03.280 records and frankly, his own lyrics that he joined 00:04:03.280 --> 00:04:05.800 the Bloods gang at a very, very young age. And 00:04:05.800 --> 00:04:08.460 this is so key. It is. This is crucial context. 00:04:08.939 --> 00:04:12.099 The violence wasn't a genre he adopted for SoundCloud 00:04:12.099 --> 00:04:14.939 later on. It wasn't an aesthetic choice. It was 00:04:14.939 --> 00:04:17.779 the fabric of his daily life. It was protection. 00:04:17.939 --> 00:04:21.060 It was community. It was a career path in a way. 00:04:21.579 --> 00:04:23.839 I was looking at his rap sheet from before he 00:04:23.839 --> 00:04:26.439 was famous. I think a lot of people assume the 00:04:26.439 --> 00:04:28.939 double murder charge was his first big run in 00:04:28.939 --> 00:04:31.980 with the law. That's not true at all. There's 00:04:31.980 --> 00:04:34.920 a deeply established pattern here. A clear escalating 00:04:34.920 --> 00:04:38.379 pattern. Go back to late 2015. Mellie is 16 years 00:04:38.379 --> 00:04:41.360 old. He gets arrested for an incident near Vero 00:04:41.360 --> 00:04:43.459 Beach High School. Right. Now, this wasn't a 00:04:43.459 --> 00:04:46.420 fistfight or some locker room brawl. He fired 00:04:46.420 --> 00:04:49.300 a gun at three other students. At a school. In 00:04:49.300 --> 00:04:51.180 the immediate vicinity of the school targeting 00:04:51.180 --> 00:04:53.560 students he had an issue with, he was convicted 00:04:53.560 --> 00:04:56.199 of aggravated battery, discharging a firearm 00:04:56.199 --> 00:04:58.500 in public, and two counts of aggravated assault. 00:04:59.019 --> 00:05:01.420 He served a year in juvenile detention for it. 00:05:01.480 --> 00:05:04.480 So at 16 years old, the threshold for using lethal 00:05:04.480 --> 00:05:07.160 force has already crossed in his mind. He's willing 00:05:07.160 --> 00:05:09.480 to pull a trigger to solve a problem. That is 00:05:09.480 --> 00:05:12.040 a massive psychological line to cross before 00:05:12.040 --> 00:05:14.220 you can even legally drive a car alone at night. 00:05:14.519 --> 00:05:17.600 Exactly. And that year in detention is actually 00:05:17.600 --> 00:05:20.620 where the YNW identity really starts to solidify. 00:05:20.660 --> 00:05:22.459 Okay, so let's break that down. What does YNW 00:05:22.459 --> 00:05:25.160 even mean? YNW stands for Young Nigga World, 00:05:25.339 --> 00:05:27.759 which they sometimes sanitize for the radio as 00:05:27.759 --> 00:05:31.579 Young New Wave. But at its core, it was a street 00:05:31.579 --> 00:05:34.100 collective. And you had the key players who, 00:05:34.180 --> 00:05:36.100 you know, become central to this whole tragedy. 00:05:36.240 --> 00:05:39.620 You had Jamel Demons, who is Melly. You had Anthony 00:05:39.620 --> 00:05:42.980 Williams, known as YNW Sack Chaser. You had Christopher 00:05:42.980 --> 00:05:46.000 Thomas Jr., who was YNW Juvie. And then Cortland 00:05:46.000 --> 00:05:48.560 Henry, YNW Bortland. And these aren't just backup 00:05:48.560 --> 00:05:50.899 dancers or guys he hired for a music video. These 00:05:50.899 --> 00:05:52.740 are his best friends. From everything I've read, 00:05:52.819 --> 00:05:55.319 they were inseparable. They are brothers in every 00:05:55.319 --> 00:05:58.180 sense but blood. They shared clothes. They shared 00:05:58.180 --> 00:06:00.600 money. shared bunk beds, they shared dreams. 00:06:00.980 --> 00:06:03.319 And when Melly comes out of that juvenile detention 00:06:03.319 --> 00:06:06.600 sentence, he starts uploading tracks to SoundCloud. 00:06:06.639 --> 00:06:09.600 I think he was only 15 when he started. And this 00:06:09.600 --> 00:06:12.459 is where the talent becomes just undeniable. 00:06:12.660 --> 00:06:14.360 It really is. I've gone back and listened to 00:06:14.360 --> 00:06:18.360 the early stuff. He has this voice. Critics at 00:06:18.360 --> 00:06:21.300 the time called it bright harmony slathered in 00:06:21.300 --> 00:06:25.339 grit. It's such a perfect description. He doesn't 00:06:25.339 --> 00:06:27.980 sound like a typical Florida trap rapper. He 00:06:27.980 --> 00:06:30.139 sounds more like an R &B singer who's seen way 00:06:30.139 --> 00:06:34.339 too much. It's soulful, almost gospel -like in 00:06:34.339 --> 00:06:38.360 its melody. But the content, the lyrics are pure 00:06:38.360 --> 00:06:41.120 street warfare. It's the juxtaposition of the 00:06:41.120 --> 00:06:43.699 sweet melody and the violent lyricism. That's 00:06:43.699 --> 00:06:45.759 the secret sauce. It creates a kind of cognitive 00:06:45.759 --> 00:06:47.519 dissonance for the listener that's incredibly 00:06:47.519 --> 00:06:51.279 compelling. And that formula. produced the track 00:06:51.279 --> 00:06:54.139 that changed everything for him. Murder on My 00:06:54.139 --> 00:06:57.259 Mind. Okay, we have to unpack this song. Yeah. 00:06:57.360 --> 00:06:59.699 Because in hindsight, looking back from where 00:06:59.699 --> 00:07:02.459 we are now in 2026, it feels less like a song 00:07:02.459 --> 00:07:04.480 and more like a prophecy. Yeah. Or a blueprint. 00:07:04.800 --> 00:07:07.180 It was released in 2017, but it really blew up 00:07:07.180 --> 00:07:09.639 in 2018. It is, for anyone who hasn't heard it, 00:07:09.680 --> 00:07:11.480 a piano -driven ballad. If you took away the 00:07:11.480 --> 00:07:13.439 lyrics, played it as an instrumental, it sounds 00:07:13.439 --> 00:07:14.980 like something you'd hear in a church or a really 00:07:14.980 --> 00:07:18.139 sad movie. It's incredibly emotive. Oh, completely. 00:07:18.379 --> 00:07:21.389 Yeah. But the lyrics. I mean, they are a first 00:07:21.389 --> 00:07:24.350 -person narrative of Nat's dental homicide, of 00:07:24.350 --> 00:07:27.209 homicidal ideation, and the psychological weight 00:07:27.209 --> 00:07:28.850 of killing someone you know. I wake up in the 00:07:28.850 --> 00:07:30.810 morning, I got murder on my mind. It's so catchy. 00:07:30.949 --> 00:07:33.069 Yeah. That's the disturbing part. You catch yourself 00:07:33.069 --> 00:07:35.470 humming it in the shower, and then you stop and 00:07:35.470 --> 00:07:37.389 you realize what you're actually saying. It's 00:07:37.389 --> 00:07:39.620 chilling. And it worked commercially. The song 00:07:39.620 --> 00:07:42.459 eventually went, what, 6X platinum? But here 00:07:42.459 --> 00:07:44.500 is the data point that really matters, the one 00:07:44.500 --> 00:07:47.259 that tells the whole story. Okay. It peaked at 00:07:47.259 --> 00:07:50.139 number 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 after he was 00:07:50.139 --> 00:07:52.680 arrested for the murders of Sack Chaser and Juvie. 00:07:52.800 --> 00:07:56.540 Wow. The crime fueled the consumption. The audience 00:07:56.540 --> 00:07:58.480 wasn't just listening to a song anymore. They 00:07:58.480 --> 00:08:00.860 were looking for clues. Right. It became part 00:08:00.860 --> 00:08:03.060 of the evidence file in the court of public opinion. 00:08:03.360 --> 00:08:06.430 That is a grim metric for success. true crime 00:08:06.430 --> 00:08:08.970 as a marketing strategy even if it wasn't intended 00:08:08.970 --> 00:08:12.649 that way but okay before the arrest he was skyrocketing 00:08:12.649 --> 00:08:14.550 we can't forget that he had the kanye west co 00:08:14.550 --> 00:08:17.350 -sign that was the absolute peak january 2019 00:08:17.350 --> 00:08:20.829 the song mixed personalities on the we all shine 00:08:20.829 --> 00:08:23.930 mixtape cole bennett directed the video you have 00:08:23.930 --> 00:08:26.579 kanye west One of the biggest, most influential 00:08:26.579 --> 00:08:28.779 artists in history standing next to this kid 00:08:28.779 --> 00:08:31.560 from Gifford, Florida, goofing around, smiling. 00:08:32.019 --> 00:08:34.620 It was a signal to the whole world that Melly 00:08:34.620 --> 00:08:37.399 was the next big thing. He had arrived. And mixed 00:08:37.399 --> 00:08:39.539 personalities isn't just a song title, is it? 00:08:39.960 --> 00:08:42.620 This brings us to the whole Melvin concept. This 00:08:42.620 --> 00:08:45.600 is where the story gets deeply psychological 00:08:45.600 --> 00:08:49.059 or maybe deeply manipulative, depending on your 00:08:49.059 --> 00:08:51.669 point of view. Who is Melvin? According to Jamel 00:08:51.669 --> 00:08:53.889 Demons, he suffers from dissociative identity 00:08:53.889 --> 00:08:56.870 disorder, or at least some form of a split personality. 00:08:57.850 --> 00:09:00.529 Melly is the artist. He's the charismatic one. 00:09:00.690 --> 00:09:02.830 He loves his mom. He wants to buy houses for 00:09:02.830 --> 00:09:04.730 his friends. He smiles for the camera. He's the 00:09:04.730 --> 00:09:06.190 entertainer. And what do you see in the Kanye 00:09:06.190 --> 00:09:08.230 video? Exactly. And then there's the other guy. 00:09:08.490 --> 00:09:10.870 Melvin. Right, Melvin. Melvin is the protector. 00:09:11.389 --> 00:09:13.669 Melvin is dark. Melvin is the one who grew up 00:09:13.669 --> 00:09:16.049 in the streets of Gifford. Melvin does what needs 00:09:16.049 --> 00:09:18.820 to be done to survive. Melvin doesn't feel empathy 00:09:18.820 --> 00:09:22.019 the way Melly does. And he leaned into this hard. 00:09:22.279 --> 00:09:25.179 It wasn't just some offhand comment in an interview. 00:09:25.320 --> 00:09:29.279 His debut studio album in November 2019 was titled 00:09:29.279 --> 00:09:32.779 Melly vs. Melvin. Which hit number eight on the 00:09:32.779 --> 00:09:36.100 Billboard 200. Commercially, this split personality 00:09:36.100 --> 00:09:38.820 narrative was a goldmine. It added mystique. 00:09:38.820 --> 00:09:40.679 It made him more interesting than just another 00:09:40.679 --> 00:09:43.940 talented rapper. But looking at it legally. through 00:09:43.940 --> 00:09:46.179 the lens of what was about to happen. It's a 00:09:46.179 --> 00:09:48.799 fascinating setup. If you establish early on 00:09:48.799 --> 00:09:51.000 in your art that Melvin is the one who commits 00:09:51.000 --> 00:09:53.120 violence, you are creating a narrative distance. 00:09:53.379 --> 00:09:55.120 I didn't do it. The guy living in my head did 00:09:55.120 --> 00:09:57.159 it. It's a defense mechanism you're planting 00:09:57.159 --> 00:09:58.840 in the public consciousness, whether you're aware 00:09:58.840 --> 00:10:00.879 of it or not. It's the Jekyll and Hyde defense, 00:10:01.100 --> 00:10:03.919 but modernized for the Instagram era, don't blame 00:10:03.919 --> 00:10:07.360 me, blame Melvin. But unfortunately, this wasn't 00:10:07.360 --> 00:10:09.919 just a concept for an album cover. In October 00:10:09.919 --> 00:10:13.340 2018, Things got very, very real. This is the 00:10:13.340 --> 00:10:15.620 turning point. The event that halted the meteoric 00:10:15.620 --> 00:10:18.720 rise and started the long, agonizing fall. October 00:10:18.720 --> 00:10:22.000 26, 2018, Fort Lauderdale. So walk us through 00:10:22.000 --> 00:10:24.159 the initial story. Because what they told the 00:10:24.159 --> 00:10:26.360 police is, I mean, it's a world away from what 00:10:26.360 --> 00:10:28.220 the police say actually happened. It's a completely 00:10:28.220 --> 00:10:31.360 different reality. Correct. So early that morning, 00:10:31.639 --> 00:10:34.519 YNW Mellie and YNW Portland, Cortland Henry, 00:10:34.820 --> 00:10:37.820 they arrive at Memorial Hospital in Miramar, 00:10:37.940 --> 00:10:41.490 Florida. They are driving a Jeep Compass. Inside 00:10:41.490 --> 00:10:43.809 the vehicle are the bodies of their two best 00:10:43.809 --> 00:10:47.350 friends, YNW Sack Chaser and YNW Juvie. Both 00:10:47.350 --> 00:10:49.809 dead. Both dead from multiple gunshot wounds. 00:10:50.029 --> 00:10:54.000 It's a bloodbath inside that car. So, Mellie 00:10:54.000 --> 00:10:56.179 and Bortland tell the police a very specific 00:10:56.179 --> 00:10:58.799 story. They say they were the victims of a drive 00:10:58.799 --> 00:11:00.759 -by shooting. The classic story. The classic 00:11:00.759 --> 00:11:04.120 story. They claim a car pulled up alongside them 00:11:04.120 --> 00:11:06.159 on the freeway and just sprayed bullets into 00:11:06.159 --> 00:11:08.399 their vehicle, killing their two friends, while 00:11:08.399 --> 00:11:10.720 Mellie and Bortland miraculously survived without 00:11:10.720 --> 00:11:13.679 a single scratch. Which is, I mean... The first 00:11:13.679 --> 00:11:16.240 red flag right there. A huge red flag. And Mellie 00:11:16.240 --> 00:11:18.679 even plays the grieving survivor on social media. 00:11:18.919 --> 00:11:21.980 He posts these emotional messages about losing 00:11:21.980 --> 00:11:24.639 his brothers to senseless violence. He's crying 00:11:24.639 --> 00:11:26.100 out against the violence in the streets that 00:11:26.100 --> 00:11:29.899 took his friends. But the police, they start 00:11:29.899 --> 00:11:33.860 looking at the Jeep. And the CSI aspect of this 00:11:33.860 --> 00:11:36.580 case is where the prosecution feels they have 00:11:36.580 --> 00:11:38.899 a slam dunk. Right, because physics don't lie. 00:11:39.080 --> 00:11:41.730 Physics don't lie. This is crucial for you to 00:11:41.730 --> 00:11:43.830 understand. We need to talk about ballistics 00:11:43.830 --> 00:11:47.070 and glass. When you shoot into a car from the 00:11:47.070 --> 00:11:50.409 outside, a drive -by, the glass breaks a certain 00:11:50.409 --> 00:11:52.690 way. The bullets travel a certain trajectory. 00:11:53.129 --> 00:11:54.750 Yeah, you'd expect the bullets to enter from 00:11:54.750 --> 00:11:56.889 the side, travel across the car, maybe embed 00:11:56.889 --> 00:11:59.190 in the opposite door, right? Exactly. And you 00:11:59.190 --> 00:12:01.009 would expect the glass debris to be scattered 00:12:01.009 --> 00:12:03.830 inside the car in a pattern consistent with an 00:12:03.830 --> 00:12:06.789 inward force. But when the forensic experts from 00:12:06.789 --> 00:12:09.009 the Broward Sheriff's Office analyzed that Jeep 00:12:09.009 --> 00:12:11.539 Compass... The whole narrative just fell apart. 00:12:11.820 --> 00:12:14.679 How so? What did they find? They found that the 00:12:14.679 --> 00:12:16.740 drive -by shots, the holes on the outside of 00:12:16.740 --> 00:12:19.240 the car, were likely staged. The angle suggested 00:12:19.240 --> 00:12:21.700 the shooter was standing still, firing into the 00:12:21.700 --> 00:12:24.139 car while it was stopped, not from another moving 00:12:24.139 --> 00:12:26.080 vehicle. Okay, so that's already bad. But what 00:12:26.080 --> 00:12:28.639 about the kill shots? That's where it gets undeniable 00:12:28.639 --> 00:12:31.500 for the prosecution. The bullets that actually 00:12:31.500 --> 00:12:33.820 took the lives of Sack Chaser and Juvie, they 00:12:33.820 --> 00:12:36.779 came from inside the car. From inside? Correct. 00:12:36.980 --> 00:12:39.720 The trajectory analysis, where they use rods 00:12:39.720 --> 00:12:42.080 to trace the path of the bullet from the entry 00:12:42.080 --> 00:12:44.500 wound through the body, showed the fatal shots 00:12:44.500 --> 00:12:46.879 originated from the back left seat of the Jeep 00:12:46.879 --> 00:12:49.340 Compass. And who was sitting in the back left 00:12:49.340 --> 00:12:51.379 seat? Surveillance footage from the recording 00:12:51.379 --> 00:12:53.519 studio they had all left just a short time earlier 00:12:53.519 --> 00:12:56.539 that night showed Y &W, Mellie, getting into 00:12:56.539 --> 00:12:59.080 that specific seat, the back left seat. So the 00:12:59.080 --> 00:13:01.000 prosecution's theory is what? They're all driving 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:03.600 together. They go somewhere. Mellie, sitting 00:13:03.600 --> 00:13:06.200 behind his friends, just shoots him. That is 00:13:06.200 --> 00:13:08.820 the prosecution's timeline. They argue they drove 00:13:08.820 --> 00:13:12.240 to a desolate area. Mellie, from behind, shoots 00:13:12.240 --> 00:13:15.240 and kills Juvie and Sack Chaser. Then he and 00:13:15.240 --> 00:13:17.080 Bortland get out of the car and shoot up their 00:13:17.080 --> 00:13:19.080 own car from the outside to make it look like 00:13:19.080 --> 00:13:21.360 an attack. And then drive the bodies around for 00:13:21.360 --> 00:13:23.080 a while before finally going to the hospital. 00:13:23.470 --> 00:13:25.950 That's the theory. And they used cell phone tower 00:13:25.950 --> 00:13:29.070 data to back it up. The data from their phones 00:13:29.070 --> 00:13:32.149 showed them driving to a remote area in the Everglades, 00:13:32.210 --> 00:13:34.710 stopping for a significant period, which is presumably 00:13:34.710 --> 00:13:37.429 when they staged the scene, and then only then 00:13:37.429 --> 00:13:40.129 driving to the hospital. It's so elaborate and 00:13:40.129 --> 00:13:42.590 so cold. I mean, there was another forensic detail 00:13:42.590 --> 00:13:44.370 that I read about that really stuck with me. 00:13:44.450 --> 00:13:48.059 It was the stippling. Yes. Gunshot stippling, 00:13:48.059 --> 00:13:51.480 or tattooing. This occurs when a gun is fired 00:13:51.480 --> 00:13:55.159 at very close range. Unburned gunpowder and particles 00:13:55.159 --> 00:13:57.720 shoot out of the barrel and hit the skin, embedding 00:13:57.720 --> 00:14:00.000 themselves and creating a telltale pattern around 00:14:00.000 --> 00:14:02.220 the wound. And one of the victims had that. One 00:14:02.220 --> 00:14:03.820 of the victims had stippling on his wound, yes. 00:14:04.000 --> 00:14:07.899 Which means the gun was inches away, not feet 00:14:07.899 --> 00:14:10.600 away from a passing car on a highway. Exactly. 00:14:10.779 --> 00:14:13.200 It indicates an execution style shooting from 00:14:13.200 --> 00:14:15.500 within the vehicle. It's the kind of evidence 00:14:15.500 --> 00:14:17.879 that is incredibly hard for a defense attorney 00:14:17.879 --> 00:14:21.080 to explain away. It's chilling. Yeah. You are 00:14:21.080 --> 00:14:23.299 talking about executing your two best friends, 00:14:23.399 --> 00:14:25.679 sitting inches away from them, and then having 00:14:25.679 --> 00:14:27.539 the presence of mind to drive around stage a 00:14:27.539 --> 00:14:30.039 crime scene and concoct a cover story. That is 00:14:30.039 --> 00:14:32.659 a level of coldness that is, it's just hard to 00:14:32.659 --> 00:14:34.960 comprehend. And that is precisely why the state 00:14:34.960 --> 00:14:37.379 of Florida went for the death penalty. They argued 00:14:37.379 --> 00:14:40.779 this was cold, calculated and premeditated. They 00:14:40.779 --> 00:14:42.899 argued it was a gang action, perhaps a dispute 00:14:42.899 --> 00:14:45.779 over money or leadership within the YNW collective. 00:14:46.100 --> 00:14:48.620 It wasn't a crime of passion. So Melly turns 00:14:48.620 --> 00:14:52.340 himself in in February 2019. He posts that now 00:14:52.340 --> 00:14:55.500 infamous Instagram caption saying, I lost my 00:14:55.500 --> 00:14:57.700 two brothers by violence and now the system wants 00:14:57.700 --> 00:15:00.580 to find justice. Basically proclaiming his innocence 00:15:00.580 --> 00:15:03.259 to his millions of fans. Yeah. And thus. begins 00:15:03.259 --> 00:15:06.700 the legal labyrinth. I mean, we are seven years 00:15:06.700 --> 00:15:09.360 in. Why is this taking so long? It feels unprecedented. 00:15:09.679 --> 00:15:11.759 It is a perfect storm of legal complications. 00:15:11.919 --> 00:15:13.940 First, of course, you had the COVID -19 delays 00:15:13.940 --> 00:15:17.460 in 2020, which just froze the entire court system 00:15:17.460 --> 00:15:19.200 for the better part of a year. Right. That affected 00:15:19.200 --> 00:15:22.169 everything. It did. But the real battle, the 00:15:22.169 --> 00:15:24.389 one that has caused the most procedural chaos 00:15:24.389 --> 00:15:27.230 in this specific case, has been the back and 00:15:27.230 --> 00:15:29.330 forth over the death penalty. Yeah, let's talk 00:15:29.330 --> 00:15:31.529 about that, because for a while it looked like 00:15:31.529 --> 00:15:33.490 the death penalty was off the table, wasn't it? 00:15:33.549 --> 00:15:37.490 It was a massive legal tug of war. In July 2022, 00:15:38.029 --> 00:15:41.769 a judge, Judge Andrew Siegel, ruled that Mellie 00:15:41.769 --> 00:15:44.370 would not face the death penalty. Why? On what 00:15:44.370 --> 00:15:46.950 grounds? It was a technicality. The prosecution 00:15:46.950 --> 00:15:49.529 had apparently failed to file the notice of intent 00:15:49.529 --> 00:15:51.690 to seek the death penalty in accordance with 00:15:51.690 --> 00:15:54.090 a new procedure. They basically missed a deadline 00:15:54.090 --> 00:15:56.350 or didn't follow a specific rule. Which must 00:15:56.350 --> 00:15:58.090 have been a massive relief for the defense team. 00:15:58.149 --> 00:16:00.570 Oh, enormous. For a few months at least. But 00:16:00.570 --> 00:16:04.370 then in November 2022, an appellate judge overruled 00:16:04.370 --> 00:16:06.590 that decision. The death penalty was put back 00:16:06.590 --> 00:16:08.409 on the table. So it's on, then it's off, then 00:16:08.409 --> 00:16:11.919 it's on again. Exactly. And then the law itself 00:16:11.919 --> 00:16:15.179 changed in Florida. And this is huge. Governor 00:16:15.179 --> 00:16:17.879 DeSantis signed a new bill that changed the requirement 00:16:17.879 --> 00:16:20.539 for a jury's death penalty recommendation. So 00:16:20.539 --> 00:16:23.379 what was the change? Previously in Florida, a 00:16:23.379 --> 00:16:26.860 jury had to be unanimous, all 12 jurors, to recommend 00:16:26.860 --> 00:16:29.960 that a defendant be sentenced to execution. The 00:16:29.960 --> 00:16:32.019 new law changed that requirement to an eight 00:16:32.019 --> 00:16:34.809 to four vote. Just a super majority. That is 00:16:34.809 --> 00:16:37.409 a huge shift. You don't need everyone to agree 00:16:37.409 --> 00:16:39.649 to execute someone anymore. Just, what, two -thirds 00:16:39.649 --> 00:16:41.509 of them? Exactly. It lowered the bar for the 00:16:41.509 --> 00:16:44.029 prosecution significantly. It meant they only 00:16:44.029 --> 00:16:47.389 had to convince eight people, not 12. So when 00:16:47.389 --> 00:16:49.330 the first trial finally started in the summer 00:16:49.330 --> 00:16:52.370 of 2023, the stakes were absolute. It was life 00:16:52.370 --> 00:16:55.509 or death with a lower threshold for death. Let's 00:16:55.509 --> 00:16:58.700 talk about that first trial, summer 2023. It 00:16:58.700 --> 00:17:00.799 was a media circus. People were live streaming 00:17:00.799 --> 00:17:03.360 it on TikTok, analyzing his facial expressions 00:17:03.360 --> 00:17:06.319 in court, his doodles on a notepad. It was a 00:17:06.319 --> 00:17:08.500 spectacle. It was. What happened inside that 00:17:08.500 --> 00:17:11.160 jury room? It was clearly intense. The prosecution 00:17:11.160 --> 00:17:13.500 laid out everything we've talked about. The ballistics, 00:17:13.680 --> 00:17:15.720 the cell phone data, the staged crime scene, 00:17:15.799 --> 00:17:18.079 the inconsistencies in the story. They painted 00:17:18.079 --> 00:17:20.299 a picture of Mellie as a ruthless gang leader, 00:17:20.460 --> 00:17:22.920 a cold -blooded killer. And the defense, what 00:17:22.920 --> 00:17:25.700 was their strategy? Their strategy was essentially 00:17:25.700 --> 00:17:28.660 reasonable doubt. They attacked the credibility 00:17:28.660 --> 00:17:31.299 of the lead detectives. They suggested the investigation 00:17:31.299 --> 00:17:34.220 was sloppy. They argued the phone wasn't always 00:17:34.220 --> 00:17:37.000 with Mellie, so the data was unreliable. And 00:17:37.000 --> 00:17:39.900 they leaned heavily on the no motive angle. Right. 00:17:40.039 --> 00:17:43.240 They kept asking the jury, why? Why would he 00:17:43.240 --> 00:17:45.380 kill his best friends when they were all on the 00:17:45.380 --> 00:17:48.500 verge of getting rich and famous together? It 00:17:48.500 --> 00:17:50.740 makes no logical sense. Which is a fair question. 00:17:50.819 --> 00:17:52.920 If you're on a ship sailing towards a mountain 00:17:52.920 --> 00:17:55.660 of gold. Why would you blow a hole in the bottom 00:17:55.660 --> 00:17:57.839 of it? And the jury really struggled with that. 00:17:57.880 --> 00:18:01.059 They deliberated for 14 hours over three days. 00:18:01.420 --> 00:18:03.619 The judge even gave them something called an 00:18:03.619 --> 00:18:06.119 Allen charge. Explain that for us. What's an 00:18:06.119 --> 00:18:09.039 Allen charge? An Allen charge is basically the 00:18:09.039 --> 00:18:12.279 judge telling a deadlock jury, look, we have 00:18:12.279 --> 00:18:14.519 spent a lot of time and taxpayer money on this 00:18:14.519 --> 00:18:17.059 trial. Please go back in there and try really, 00:18:17.140 --> 00:18:19.539 really hard to come to an agreement. So it's 00:18:19.539 --> 00:18:21.539 a pressure tactic. It's a significant pressure 00:18:21.539 --> 00:18:24.180 tactic to try and avoid a mistrial. But in this 00:18:24.180 --> 00:18:28.539 case, it didn't work. No. On July 22, 2023, the 00:18:28.539 --> 00:18:30.759 judge had no choice but to declare a mistrial. 00:18:31.500 --> 00:18:35.200 The jury was hopelessly deadlocked. Rumors swirled 00:18:35.200 --> 00:18:37.559 about the split. Some said it was 9 -3 in favor 00:18:37.559 --> 00:18:39.819 of a guilty verdict. Others said it was closer. 00:18:40.019 --> 00:18:42.980 But the point is, they couldn't get to a unanimous 00:18:42.980 --> 00:18:46.049 decision on guilt. So mistrial means reset. You 00:18:46.049 --> 00:18:47.769 hit the reset button and you have to do it all 00:18:47.769 --> 00:18:50.349 over again with a new jury. But here we are in 00:18:50.349 --> 00:18:53.029 early 2026 and the second trial still hasn't 00:18:53.029 --> 00:18:55.369 happened. Why the three -year gap? That seems 00:18:55.369 --> 00:18:56.970 like the biggest delay of all. This is where 00:18:56.970 --> 00:18:59.980 we enter the current limbo. In January 2024, 00:19:00.440 --> 00:19:03.279 the entire process ground to a halt over a dispute 00:19:03.279 --> 00:19:06.359 about digital evidence, specifically a promotional 00:19:06.359 --> 00:19:08.680 video. A video? What kind of video? It was a 00:19:08.680 --> 00:19:10.640 mini documentary about Mellie's life that his 00:19:10.640 --> 00:19:13.059 own team had produced. The prosecution wanted 00:19:13.059 --> 00:19:15.420 to show it to the jury to prove his gang affiliation 00:19:15.420 --> 00:19:18.019 and what they called his criminal mindset. What 00:19:18.019 --> 00:19:20.240 was in it? It apparently showed him with weapons, 00:19:20.380 --> 00:19:22.420 throwing up gang signs, discussing the street 00:19:22.420 --> 00:19:24.960 lifestyle. The defense argued it was hearsay, 00:19:24.980 --> 00:19:26.940 that it was artistic expression, and that it 00:19:26.940 --> 00:19:29.339 would prejudice the jury. unfairly against him. 00:19:29.480 --> 00:19:32.400 Basically, the wrap -on trial debate in a nutshell. 00:19:32.500 --> 00:19:35.140 Exactly. The judge sided with the defense and 00:19:35.140 --> 00:19:37.019 ruled to suppress it, meaning the jury would 00:19:37.019 --> 00:19:38.960 not be allowed to see it. And the prosecution 00:19:38.960 --> 00:19:41.779 appealed that ruling. Yes. They filed what's 00:19:41.779 --> 00:19:44.619 called an interlocutory appeal. And when you 00:19:44.619 --> 00:19:47.200 appeal a pretrial ruling like that to a higher 00:19:47.200 --> 00:19:50.579 court, the trial clock stops. Everything freezes. 00:19:50.599 --> 00:19:52.660 You have to wait for the appellate court to make 00:19:52.660 --> 00:19:55.700 their decision. And that takes... A long time. 00:19:55.740 --> 00:19:58.279 That takes months, sometimes years. And that 00:19:58.279 --> 00:20:00.640 is why the date kept slipping. A date was set 00:20:00.640 --> 00:20:03.720 for early 2025. Then that came and went. October 00:20:03.720 --> 00:20:06.900 2025 came and went. Now the official docket says 00:20:06.900 --> 00:20:09.779 January 2027. That is just agonizing. By the 00:20:09.779 --> 00:20:12.559 time 2027 rolls around, Mellie will have been 00:20:12.559 --> 00:20:15.079 in Broward County Jail for eight years. He went 00:20:15.079 --> 00:20:17.779 in at 19 years old. He will be nearly 28 when 00:20:17.779 --> 00:20:20.130 he faces a jury for the second time. It raises 00:20:20.130 --> 00:20:22.710 very serious constitutional questions about the 00:20:22.710 --> 00:20:25.769 right to a speedy trial. But on a human level, 00:20:25.829 --> 00:20:27.890 it means his entire young adulthood has been 00:20:27.890 --> 00:20:30.609 erased. He's effectively grown up in a cell waiting. 00:20:30.869 --> 00:20:33.089 And let's talk about his career during this time. 00:20:33.529 --> 00:20:35.829 Because unlike some artists who get locked up 00:20:35.829 --> 00:20:38.170 and disappear, he tried to keep the music coming. 00:20:38.750 --> 00:20:41.009 But you can only record so many verses over a 00:20:41.009 --> 00:20:43.470 jail phone, right? The decline has been stark, 00:20:43.569 --> 00:20:47.109 and it's a lesson in modern celebrity. In 2021, 00:20:47.529 --> 00:20:50.690 while he was inside, his team released the album 00:20:50.690 --> 00:20:53.410 Just a Matter of Slime. And that one did okay, 00:20:53.589 --> 00:20:55.430 I remember. It did okay. It peaked at number 00:20:55.430 --> 00:20:57.930 11 on the charts. But that's because they had 00:20:57.930 --> 00:21:00.250 a vault of pre -recorded vocals. They could still 00:21:00.250 --> 00:21:02.529 put together songs. They had features from big 00:21:02.529 --> 00:21:05.710 names like Lil Baby, Lil Uzi Vert, Future. There 00:21:05.710 --> 00:21:07.690 was still momentum. But the vault runs empty 00:21:07.690 --> 00:21:11.210 eventually. It did. In 2024, the album Young 00:21:11.210 --> 00:21:13.470 New Wave dropped. And it was met with silence. 00:21:13.730 --> 00:21:16.009 Crickets. Complete crickets. It was generally 00:21:16.009 --> 00:21:18.970 panned by critics as being uninspired. But more 00:21:18.970 --> 00:21:21.549 importantly, it failed to chart in any significant 00:21:21.549 --> 00:21:24.670 way. It proved a harsh reality of the music industry. 00:21:25.210 --> 00:21:28.029 Infamy and notoriety can only sustain a career 00:21:28.029 --> 00:21:30.970 for so long. Without physical presence, without 00:21:30.970 --> 00:21:33.589 touring, without new music videos, without new 00:21:33.589 --> 00:21:36.230 lived experiences to write about, the audience 00:21:36.230 --> 00:21:39.430 eventually moves on. The free melly trend on 00:21:39.430 --> 00:21:42.470 TikTok died down. The machine needs to be fed. 00:21:42.630 --> 00:21:45.430 It's the out of sight, out of mind rule. You 00:21:45.430 --> 00:21:47.309 can be the biggest story in the world for a year, 00:21:47.349 --> 00:21:49.390 but if you aren't feeding the content machine, 00:21:49.509 --> 00:21:51.049 the machine just finds someone else to focus 00:21:51.049 --> 00:21:53.549 on. Precisely. And we shouldn't forget, while 00:21:53.549 --> 00:21:55.430 all this is happening, while he's fighting this 00:21:55.430 --> 00:21:58.890 double murder case, he is also still a suspect 00:21:58.890 --> 00:22:02.119 in another murder. The 2017 killing of Sheriff's 00:22:02.119 --> 00:22:04.339 Deputy Gary Chambliss in Gifford. That's right. 00:22:04.400 --> 00:22:06.519 I totally forgot about that. Amidst all the headlines 00:22:06.519 --> 00:22:09.259 about sack chaser and juvie, he hasn't been convicted 00:22:09.259 --> 00:22:11.839 of that, right? Just a suspect. No conviction. 00:22:11.859 --> 00:22:14.359 No charges have been formally filed in that case. 00:22:14.559 --> 00:22:17.819 But being a named suspect in the death of a law 00:22:17.819 --> 00:22:20.680 enforcement officer that hangs over the courtroom 00:22:20.680 --> 00:22:24.500 like a dark cloud, it reinforces the prosecution's 00:22:24.500 --> 00:22:26.940 narrative that Mellie isn't a musician who made 00:22:26.940 --> 00:22:31.099 one. terrible mistake. He is a career violent 00:22:31.099 --> 00:22:34.440 offender who just happens to rap. It colors every 00:22:34.440 --> 00:22:37.339 bail hearing, every motion. And that brings us 00:22:37.339 --> 00:22:40.240 right back to the rap on trial debate. We see 00:22:40.240 --> 00:22:42.500 this with Young Thug and the YSL case in Atlanta. 00:22:42.720 --> 00:22:45.319 We see it here. Prosecutors are using lyrics, 00:22:45.480 --> 00:22:48.259 videos and artistic personas as evidence of guilt. 00:22:48.670 --> 00:22:51.089 It is the central friction of modern hip -hop 00:22:51.089 --> 00:22:53.809 law. It truly is. If Johnny Cash sings, I shot 00:22:53.809 --> 00:22:56.210 a man in Reno just to watch him die, we all agree 00:22:56.210 --> 00:22:58.150 it's storytelling. Nobody checks the Reno police 00:22:58.150 --> 00:23:01.130 logs from 1955. Right, it's art. But when YNW 00:23:01.130 --> 00:23:03.670 Melly sings Murder on My Mind, describing a shooting 00:23:03.670 --> 00:23:06.190 in the first person with specific emotional details, 00:23:06.630 --> 00:23:08.730 prosecutors hold it up in front of a jury and 00:23:08.730 --> 00:23:10.670 call it a confession. And because the Melvin 00:23:10.670 --> 00:23:13.670 persona is so explicitly defined by him as a 00:23:13.670 --> 00:23:16.250 violent entity, he kind of handed them that weapon 00:23:16.250 --> 00:23:19.200 to use against him, didn't he? He did. He blurred 00:23:19.200 --> 00:23:21.400 the line between art and reality so effectively 00:23:21.400 --> 00:23:23.359 that now the legal system can't tell the difference 00:23:23.359 --> 00:23:25.180 either. And the prosecution's argument is simple. 00:23:25.680 --> 00:23:28.140 He told you who he was. He told you about Melvin. 00:23:28.220 --> 00:23:31.500 Believe him. So let's zoom out. We are looking 00:23:31.500 --> 00:23:34.720 at a tragedy with no winners. Sack Chaser and 00:23:34.720 --> 00:23:37.140 Juvie are dead. Their families have been waiting 00:23:37.140 --> 00:23:39.259 nearly a decade for justice with no closure. 00:23:39.789 --> 00:23:42.250 Melly is, for all intents and purposes, rotting 00:23:42.250 --> 00:23:45.150 in a cell. The music career is on life support. 00:23:45.490 --> 00:23:47.890 It is a lose, lose, lose situation. There is 00:23:47.890 --> 00:23:50.529 no happy ending here, regardless of the verdict 00:23:50.529 --> 00:23:53.410 in Troll Me 27. It's just different degrees of 00:23:53.410 --> 00:23:55.390 tragedy. So what does this all mean? When we 00:23:55.390 --> 00:23:57.930 look back at the rise and the fall of YNW Melly, 00:23:58.049 --> 00:24:00.529 what is the ultimate takeaway from this story? 00:24:00.970 --> 00:24:04.069 I think it serves as a grim, modern, cautionary 00:24:04.069 --> 00:24:06.309 tale about the intersection of incredible talent, 00:24:06.470 --> 00:24:09.269 a toxic environment and personal choices. You 00:24:09.269 --> 00:24:10.970 can have all the talent in the world, a voice 00:24:10.970 --> 00:24:13.210 that can captivate millions, a cosign from Kanye 00:24:13.210 --> 00:24:16.170 West, but you cannot outrun your past or your 00:24:16.170 --> 00:24:19.869 actions. And the legal system for all its flaws 00:24:19.869 --> 00:24:23.829 and its agonizing delays is a machine that grinds 00:24:23.829 --> 00:24:26.150 slowly, but it grinds on. It doesn't care about 00:24:26.150 --> 00:24:28.109 your billboard placement or your streaming numbers. 00:24:28.390 --> 00:24:30.869 It's the paradox we started this whole. deep 00:24:30.869 --> 00:24:33.849 dive with the melody and the murder you listen 00:24:33.849 --> 00:24:36.410 to murder on my mind today and it hits completely 00:24:36.410 --> 00:24:38.890 differently than it did in 2018 it doesn't sound 00:24:38.890 --> 00:24:40.569 like a hit song anymore it sounds like a ghost 00:24:40.569 --> 00:24:43.390 story and until that retrial happens in 2027 00:24:43.390 --> 00:24:46.670 if it happens then that ghost story is the only 00:24:46.670 --> 00:24:50.269 ending we have a story frozen in time i want 00:24:50.269 --> 00:24:51.849 to leave the listener with a final thought to 00:24:51.849 --> 00:24:55.509 chew on we as a culture often romanticize the 00:24:55.509 --> 00:24:59.009 tortured artist or the gangster rapper We consume 00:24:59.009 --> 00:25:01.289 the violence as entertainment. But in this case, 00:25:01.309 --> 00:25:02.930 the violence stepped out of the speakers and 00:25:02.930 --> 00:25:05.490 into the backseat of a Jeep Compass. It stopped 00:25:05.490 --> 00:25:07.950 being entertainment and it became Exhibit A in 00:25:07.950 --> 00:25:11.309 a murder trial. Exactly. So as we sit here in 00:25:11.309 --> 00:25:15.750 2026 and wait for 2027, ask yourself, is Melvin 00:25:15.750 --> 00:25:18.910 a mask that Jamel Demons wears to protect himself 00:25:18.910 --> 00:25:21.210 from the world, a character he created for his 00:25:21.210 --> 00:25:24.240 art? Or is Melly, the happy singing artist, the 00:25:24.240 --> 00:25:26.599 actual mask, hiding a person who was capable 00:25:26.599 --> 00:25:28.900 of killing his best friends all along? That is 00:25:28.900 --> 00:25:30.759 the question the next jury will finally have 00:25:30.759 --> 00:25:32.680 to answer. Look at the timeline for yourself. 00:25:33.019 --> 00:25:35.480 Listen to the music again. Decide for yourself. 00:25:35.720 --> 00:25:37.839 Thanks for diving deep with us. Stay curious. 00:25:38.220 --> 00:25:38.960 We'll catch you on the next one.