Two commercially successful and award-winning rappers from Sweden were sentenced to prison in a major criminal organization takedown this week. The sweeping case has convicted 25 other individuals, including a top local soccer player. Yasin Mahamoud and Haval Khalil, who have gained notoriety as artists under the respective stage names of Yasin and HAVAL, were two of the most surprising people involved in the criminal network, however. They were both found guilty and sentenced for the kidnapping of an unnamed rival artist that took place in April 2020.
According to HipHopDX, Yasin tried to lure the victim to a recording studio in Stockholm in March 2020, but after his initial kidnapping plot unraveled, HAVAL successfully carried it out one month later, beating and robbing the victim without Yasin’s direct involvement.
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Still, both of the rappers were found guilty in the situation. Yasin Mahamoud was sentenced to 10 months in prison despite denying his involvement, and HAVAL was handed a heftier sentence of 2.5 years. According to HipHopDX, however, the combined years that everyone in the Swedish criminal network takedown received totals out to 147 years, with the organization’s leader, 33-year-old Chihab Lamouri, receiving the longest sentence at nearly 18 years in jail.
According to HipHopDX, Yasin was actually named Artist of the Year and Hip Hop/RnB Artist of the Year at Sweden’s P3 Gold Awards in March, and HAVAL has been racking up millions of streams following his 2020 project INLOGGAD.
Check out the two artists’ most recent music videos below.
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