Rapper 6ix9ine (born Daniel Hernandez) has pleaded guilty to nine federal charges in court on Saturday and will cooperate with prosecutors, NBC News and TMZ reports. According to court documents, 6ix9ine entered his plea on January 23 in regards to narcotics trafficking, racketeering, and weapons charges. 6ix9ine was arrested in November as he was just beginning a four-year probation sentence stemming from a sexual misconduct charge involving a 13-year-old girl. Page Six reports that the plea was sealed in order to give law enforcement more time to make arrests related to the case. From NBC News:
According to documents, the rapper plead guilty Saturday, but court records were sealed. Prosecutors applied to unseal the documents Thursday. The motion was granted Friday.
6ix9ine will cooperate with federal officials “against multiple violent people associated with the same criminal enterprise of which he admits, or will soon apparently admit, being a member,” according to court records.
Last year, former members of 6ix9ine’s management team were arrested on the same charges the rapper faces. The indictment states 6ix9ine and the other defendants “participated in the operation and management of the Enterprise [i.e. the street gang Nine Trey Gangsta Bloods]” and accuses the members of robbery, assault, and murder. The trial is scheduled to start on September 4, 2019 and 6ix9ine is slated to be sentenced by January 24, 2020.
The rapper initially planned on pleading not guilty, with his attorney Lance Lazaro telling Rolling Stone in December that his client would “under no circumstances” cooperate with authorities for a reduced sentence. Before entering the plea deal, the 22-year-old was facing a minimum of 32 years in prison.
