Tekashi 6ix9ine pleads guilty to 9 criminal offenses

Controversial American rapper, Tekashi 6ix9ine who entered a plea deal last week with federal prosecutors has pleaded guilty to nine different crimes.

The 22-year-old rapper whose real name is Daniel Hernandez pleaded guilty to different felony charges, including racketeering, conspiracy, firearms offenses, and narcotics trafficking.

He pleaded guilty in Brooklyn to disorderly conduct in connection with a May traffic stop. In 2015, he was sentenced to probation for appearing in a video in which a 13-year-old girl performed a sex act on another man.

During the plea, 6ix9ine said he joined the Nine Trey Blood Gang in fall 2017 and helped gang members try to kill a rival last March.

“I did this to maintain or increase my own standing in Nine Trey,” he told Judge Paul A Engelmayer. He said he also “knew that another member of Nine Trey had a gun and discharged that gun”.

The rapper said he also helped other gang members rob people at gunpoint as part of a pledge by new gang members to commit at least two crimes.

On 2 June last year, he said, he “paid a person to shoot at a rival member of Nine Trey to scare him”. That shooting, he added, occurred in Manhattan. 6ix9ine said he also was paid for participating in the sale of a kilogram of cocaine in 2017.

“I apologize to the court, to anyone who was hurt, to my family, friends, and fans for what I have done and who I have let down,” 6ix9ine said.

According to The Guardian UK, with the plea deal he struck with prosecutors, the rapper can gain leniency at sentencing from an otherwise mandatory minimum 47 years in prison if he admits to all crimes and testifies truthfully.

His sentencing is set for 23 January 2020.