{"id":398417,"date":"2026-08-05T15:42:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T15:42:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/398417\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T15:42:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T15:42:08","slug":"houston-rapper-convicted-in-gang-related-drive-by-murder-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/398417\/","title":{"rendered":"Houston rapper convicted in gang-related drive-by-murder case"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Alexandra Nicks, a Houston rapper who goes by the name <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chron.com\/news\/houston-texas\/houston\/article\/Rapper-s-visit-at-2-HISD-schools-sparks-13378469.php\" data-link=\"native\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"\">OMB Bloodbath<\/a>, became the last of six convicted by a federal jury in a drive-by shooting trial on Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Nicks, 32, was indicted alongside Shaquile O\u2019Neal Richards in 2023. She is accused of leading the 103 Gang in a coordinated attack on rival group Young Scott Block (YSB), in which a retaliatory drive-by shooting killed Samuel Johnson, a 52-year-old innocent bystander. According to the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.justice.gov\/opa\/pr\/two-houston-gang-leaders-convicted-trial-ordering-drive-murder-innocent-bystander\" data-link=\"native\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"\">Justice Department<\/a>, Nicks and Richards ordered lower-ranking members of the 103 Gang to open fire on a YSB member in Oct. 2017. The four lower-ranking members, Deandre Watson, Mertroy Harris, Marcus Christopher, and Marquis Erskin, shot the intended target (who survived) before also hitting Johnson with a stray bullet.<\/p>\n<p>Sentencing for Nicks and O&#8217;Neal will be on Nov. 4. Watson, Harris, Christopher and Erskin each pleaded guilty, with their sentencing set for Sept. 2. All six face up to life in prison.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If you wage war on our streets, terrorize our communities, and put innocent Texans in the crosshairs, my office will come for you,&#8221; U.S. Attorney Aaron\u00a0Reitz for the Southern District of Texas, said in the Department of Justice&#8217;s release. &#8220;We will dismantle violent gangs, prosecute the criminals who lead them, and put them behind bars where they belong.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Houston\u2019s neighborhoods belong to law-abiding citizens, not to violent gangs.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Nicks and Richards are officially convicted of using a firearm to kill during a racketeering murder and murder in aid of racketeering, per a release from the U.S. Department of Justice. Nicks and Shaquile O\u2019Neal Richards were indicted for the 2017 shooting in 2023.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Nicks, who grew up in Houston&#8217;s Third Ward, signed with\u00a0Interscope Records as OMB Bloodbath in 2020 and gained national attention through collaborations with artists including Maxo Kream and Megan Thee Stallion. Her most recent release was the 2022 EP Remedies to Infinity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Alexandra Nicks, a Houston rapper who goes by the name OMB Bloodbath, became the last of six convicted&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398418,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[1836,1704,56,58,57],"class_list":["post-398417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-chronnews","tag-chronstaff","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398417\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}