Florida Rapper Arrested Over Song Lyrics That Mention Shooting

The video was originally posted on March 22, and police investigating the matter claim that McCallum also mentioned the possibility of violence at a downtown Gainesville club called “Eight Seconds.” The video was uploaded a day before that club hosted a concert by a local rapper named Keyanta Bullard, also known as “Yungeen Ace.” Deputies state that McCallum mentions an ongoing feud and states that the aforementioned concert could be a potential/hypothetical site for retaliation, though no such violence occurred.

This past Tuesday McCallum was arrested. Florida statutes state that threatening to kill or injure someone is felony territory, and so to is “writing, composing, sending or procuring something that indicates the person will conduct a mass shooting or act of terrorism.” How this would pertain to rap lyrics (especially considering just how authentic/inauthentic they are) and rap personas (especially considering just how authentic/inauthentic they are) would appear to be open to interpretation. The law had been updated following the February 2018 school shooting at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School when “threatening a mass shooting” was made a crime. In the meantime McCallum is in jail with bond set at $50,000.

The AP adds that McCallum’s case is similar to one wherein Pennsylvania rapper Jamal Knox (who goes by Mayhem Mal) allegedly made threats against two cops. Lyrics in that song contained the line “Let’s kill these cops cuz they don’t do us no good,” prior to naming the officers. Knox had been found guilty in a non-jury trial, with a state appeals court upholding the conviction as they reasoned it crossed a “true threat doctrine” which is unprotected by the First Amendment.