Arrest warrant issued for Kodak Black in South Florida follows rapper’s long rap sheet
Rapper Kodak Black may soon see the inside of a Broward County jail after a judge issued an arrest warrant against him on Thursday.
Authorities say the performer, whose legal name is Bill Kahan Kapri, 25, violated his pretrial release conditions by failing to submit to a drug test on Feb. 3 before finally going to the lab on Feb. 8, testing positive for fentanyl, according to the warrant.
Kapri’s most recent legal woes stem from his arrest last year, when Florida Highway Patrol troopers say they found oxycodone tablets inside his vehicle. For that reason, the Florida native was arrested and is facing charges of possession of a controlled substance without a prescription and trafficking oxycodone of less than 25 grams, to which he pleaded not guilty, court documents show.
READ MORE: Arrest warrant issued against rapper Kodak Black in Broward County, court records show
Because the rapper is no stranger to law enforcement in South Florida, here is a list of some of his arrests and other troubles with law enforcement within the past decade:
▪ July 2022: Troopers pulled Kapri over on July 15 in Fort Lauderdale because they thought the windows of his purple Dodge Durango “appeared to be darker than the legal limit” and the SUV’s registration tag was expired. Inside the vehicle, the officers say, they found 31 oxycodone tablets. The case is still pending.
▪ Feb. 2022: Kapri and three others were shot outside a restaurant in Los Angeles, NBC News reported.
▪ Jan. 2022: On New Year’s Day, he was arrested on a trespassing charge in his hometown of Pompano Beach in violation of a cease-and-desist order. The charges were later dropped, Rolling Stone reported.
READ MORE: ‘I’m evolving:’ Kodak Black speaks out after latest arrest in South Florida
▪ April 2021: The Tallahassee Democrat reported that a security guard for the rapper was injured after he was shot near a Tallahassee McDonald’s in an incident that involved Kapri’s entourage. The rapper, who had performed in a concert earlier, was not injured.
▪ Jan. 2021: Then-President Donald Trump pardoned Kapri, and the performer ended up serving about half of his 46-month federal prison sentence that stemmed from gun charges in Miami-Dade County.
READ MORE: Among Floridians granted clemency by Trump: rich elites, rappers, an elderly pot dealer
▪ April 2019: Kapri was one of four men arrested after being found with weapons and drugs at the U.S.-Canada border, New York State police said. He pleaded guilty to a weapons charge in March 2020, according to WKBW in Buffalo. He was sentenced in March 2020 to one year in prison for the New York incident, the (Rochester, N.Y.) Democrat & Chronicle reported.
READ MORE: Rapper Kodak Black, charged in SC rape, caught at US border with drugs, guns, cops say
READ MORE: Rapper Kodak Black pleads guilty to lying to gun seller, faces decade in prison
▪ Aug. 2019: Kapri, 22 at the time, pleaded guilty to lying on a background-check form when he purchased handguns at a Hialeah weapons store in January of that year, and again in March when he attempted to buy more firearms. In November, he was sentenced to 46 months in federal prison. “Young people do stupid things and I normally give them a break for that,” Judge Federico Moreno told Kapri during his sentencing hearing. “The problem is that you have been doing stupid things since 15.”
READ MORE: Rapper Kodak Black sentenced to 46 months in prison on federal weapons charges
▪ Jan. 2018: The Broward Sheriff’s Office arrested the then-20-year-old, whose legal name at the time was Dieuson Octave, on charges of possession of weapons by a convicted felon, marijuana possession, grand theft in the third degree, and neglecting a child with no bodily harm after deputies were alerted to a livestream on Kodak Black’s Instagram feed, the Miami New Times reported. The video showed the rapper with his child in his Pembroke Pines home, surrounded by drugs and weapons. Many of these charges were later dropped, according to county court records.
READ MORE: From new video release to jail house tweet, Kodak Black’s week finds rapper arrested
▪ June 2017: The young rapper was put in handcuffs for violating house arrest after he went to the adult bar Club Climaxx in Miami, where he was accused of punching and kicking a woman who was a bartender there, and for going to the Adrien Broner-Adrian Granados boxing match in Cincinnati in February of that year. According to complex.com, no formal charges were filed in connection with the alleged attack.
READ MORE: Rapper went to a strip club and a boxing match while on house arrest, state says
▪ April 2017: He was arrested after being accused of violating his probation.
▪ Aug. 2016: He was sentenced to a year of house arrest and five years of probation after facing charges including possession of a weapon by a convicted felon and fleeing and eluding a police officer.
READ MORE: Rapper Kodak Black arrested again. This time for a probation violation
▪ Feb. 2016: The then-18-year-old was arrested in South Carolina on a criminal sexual assault charge after he was accused of raping a high school girl. In April 2021, he was sentenced to probation after pleading guilty to the lesser charge of first-degree assault, according to The Associated Press.
▪ Oct. 2015: He was charged in Pompano Beach with robbery, battery, two counts of false imprisonment of a child under 13, three counts of false imprisonment of an adult, driving with a suspended license, and possession of marijuana. In 2016, a judge withheld a conviction after the young rapper changed his plea from not guilty to no contest, court record shows.
Miami Herald staff writer Howard Cohen contributed to this report.
