DEFYING THE CODE OF SILENCE

When police arrested the 18-year-old for car theft, they had no clue that he held the key to solving four homicides — and nearly dismantling a West Philadelphia gang.

It was a warm afternoon in September 2021 when police spotted the stolen black Audi A6 parked on a block in Northeast Philadelphia, and watched from afar as the teen slid behind the wheel. Just as he drove away, officers surrounded the car and arrested him.

He had never had a run-in with police before. And now here he was, handcuffed inside the major-crimes unit, facing felony charges. He was panicking.

Officers were nearly finished processing him when he blurted out something that seemed almost unbelievable: He had information about four murders.

He knew the dates and approximate locations of each killing, he told police — and the nicknames of all of the shooters. There was Ya and Reek and Murda K, he told them. Curry and F5ive, too.

The officers’ ears perked up. These were members of the Young Face Arrangers and Young Bag Chasers, two allied West and North Philadelphia gangs that had grown increasingly notorious for committing shootings across the city and then writing merciless songs about them.

The teen ultimately agreed to tell police what he knew and testify before a grand jury and at a public trial. In exchange, his criminal record for the stolen car would be expunged — and his conscience, burdened by the weight of knowing one of the innocent teens who’d been killed, could be eased.

The witness, now 21, declined to be interviewed for this article. His mother spoke on his behalf, and asked that she and her son not be identified because of ongoing threats to their safety.

But a review of dozens of court records and interviews with police and prosecutors, the witness’ mother, and victims’ families offer a rare look inside a sprawling case that ultimately put five central members of two gangs behind bars for decades.

He was crucial. Without him, we wouldn’t have anyone.

And it shows the impact of one young man’s brave decision to defy the code of silence that has long plagued Philadelphia, where witnesses over the years have been stalked and killed in brazen, public fashion, sometimes even after being provided protection by authorities.

“I’ve never seen a young kid do that,” said Southwest Philadelphia Detective Mikal Carr. “He was crucial. Without him, we wouldn’t have anyone.”

But the obstacles and risks that the young man faced in the aftermath — how his safety was at such risk that he stayed in a hotel under a fake name when in town for trial, and now lives more than a thousand miles away, cut off from half his family — underscores why so many people never do the same.

“These kids are bragging in songs about the people they killed,” said Assistant District Attorney Cydney Pope. “What’s one more person to them?”

The teen’s mother said she noticed years ago how easily her son was influenced by others, particularly family members who had a history with crime. She’ll never forget, she said, when she walked outside to find her son, just 13 at the time, using toy guns to mimic a shootout with his cousins. She decided then and there, she said, that she had to leave Philadelphia.

After she and her son moved more than a thousand miles away, she said, he would visit the city for a few weeks each year to spend time with family. She always felt uneasy about these visits, she said, but knew it was important for him to see his father.

Then, after his grandmother died in June 2021, her son returned for the funeral and decided to stay for the summer.

He came back to the city during one of the most violent stretches in Philadelphia history — a year in which more people were shot and killed than ever before.

Among those doing the killing were members of Young Face Arrangers and Young Bag Chasers, said Pope, the prosecutor.

Originally based out of the Mantua section of West Philadelphia, YBC had been on the rise in the city’s drill rap scene, a subgenre of hip-hop known for violent lyrics, since 2019. The group’s popularity went hand in hand with the growing number of shootings they committed, Pope said.

While Philadelphia’s street groups and gangs were largely based around money and drug sales in decades past, today’s crews of young men are almost entirely centered on social media clout and drill, said Carr, the police detective.

“Clout is the currency,” he said.

And the easiest way to gain it is through music and violence, he said. The greater a song’s shock factor — often measured on the number of insults to the dead — the more popular it will be.

Few people have benefited from that combination more than Abdul Vicks, a.k.a. YBC Dul, a 24-year-old rapper who Pope said is the ring leader of YBC. Vicks, one of the most popular drill artists in Philly, has not been accused of any crimes, but he raps as if he has.

“I don’t even want his chain, when I catch him, I want his dreads,” YBC Dul sings in one song.

He did not respond to a request for comment.

As YBC’s reach expanded, it formed an alliance with YFA, a North Philly crew known for shootings.

Among YFA’s main members were Arshad Curry, a.k.a. “Most Wanted,” and Raheis Sherman, better known as “F5ive.” There’s Zaire Crawford, a.k.a. “1k” or “Murda K”; Yaseam Miles, known as “Baby Wick” or “Ya Ya”; and Semaj Nolan, a.k.a. “Reek12Hunnit.”

The union meant that YBC’s enemies, or “opps,” were now YFA’s, and vice versa. They collaborated on songs and took credit for each other’s victims, or “bodies.” YBC was a more well-known group, and the two became synonymous.

“If you ain’t got a body you can’t roll with us,” Sherman sang in one song.

As of April 2024, in just the last 16 months, YBC-related feuds have led to the shootings of at least 30 people, said Sheida Ghadiri, an assistant district attorney with the Gun Violence Task Force. Some of the victims have had nothing to do with the ongoing conflicts.

Violence involving the group has been ongoing for years, but started escalating in 2021 and was especially concentrated in West Philadelphia.

“YBC alone, what they did to these neighborhoods in West Philly is unimaginable,” said Carr.

May 25, 2021, was a particularly violent night — an evening when, within just 30 minutes, YBC members shot and killed two teenagers on separate sides of the city.

The first victim was Nasir Marks, an 18-year-old just two weeks away from graduating high school. After spending the evening practicing a speech for his senior project, Marks went to go see his girlfriend, who lived in the Mantua section of West Philadelphia.

Meanwhile, Nolan and Crawford were driving a stolen, seafoam-green Subaru through the area, looking for a rival 39th Street gang member. Instead, they found Marks just after he stepped off the bus, Pope said, and shot him multiple times, killing him. It was a case of mistaken identity.

YBC alone, what they did to these neighborhoods in West Philly is unimaginable.

The shooters fled in the Subaru. Crawford and Nolan quickly ditched the getaway car in North Philadelphia, then hopped into a stolen black GMC with Miles, and headed north on another mission: Find Kanye Pittman.

Pittman, a 15-year-old freshman at Benjamin Franklin High School, was on the 2500 block of North Sydenham Street, or the “back block,” an alleyway where kids hang out after school. He was sitting on the steps talking to a friend, when Crawford, Nolan, and two others walked up and started shooting.

Crawford ran up to Pittman and shot him multiple times at close range. He died within minutes.

Within hours, Crawford handed off the guns prosecutors say he and Nolan used to kill both teens. All it required was a quick text to a friend. “I need a swap,” he wrote, accompanied by a photo of the black and tan Glocks.

YBC immediately trolled the victims and their families online and in songs. They referenced Pittman as the “youngbul from the back block.” They bragged about killing two people in one day.

“We spin back to back. Two bodies in one day, they know what’s up,” Nolan would later sing.

» READ MORE: Four of the many lives stolen by Young Bag Chasers

Eight weeks later, on July 21, Curry, Sherman, and a third person went out in search of another rival in Southwest Philadelphia. Instead, they ended up shooting and killing teen best friends Kaylin Jahad “K.J.” Johnson, 16, and Tommie Frazier, 18 — two young men who had nothing to do with the feud.

In the moments after the shooting, Curry and Sherman drove to a friend’s house in Northeast Philadelphia to tell their associates what they’d done. Among them, quietly listening that night was the 18-year-old who would become an eventual witness.

The teen was in over his head.

He was not a member of YBC/YFA, Pope said, but a close relative was. He tried to fit in with them during that summer, but he is not suspected of being involved in any violent crime, Pope said.

When police arrested him for the stolen car, his mind was racing. He was scared, he later said in court, and wanted to go home.

Plus, his mother said in an interview, he owed YBC no loyalty. Because he was not in the group or involved with their shootings, she said, he owed them nothing.

“My son has a really bright future ahead of him. We’re not going to taint his future with him taking a charge,” she said. “He does not owe them any loyalty.”

She said that beyond wanting to protect his future, her son was deeply affected by K.J. Johnson’s death.

“I think he saw himself in K.J.,” she said. They didn’t know each other, she said, but they both played basketball and, while familiar with people in the streets, steered clear of violence themselves.

As the 18-year-old walked out of police custody that afternoon, a homicide detective served him a subpoena in front of his relatives. Word spread quickly that he was working with police. (That was a grave mistake, Pope said, and the detective is no longer working in homicide.)

“Mom, I want to come home,” the mother recalled her son saying. “This life is not for me. I just want to come home.”

He was on a flight out of Philadelphia the next day.

Prosecutors had solid evidence tying Miles, Crawford, and Nolan to the murders: text messages referencing the shooting, cell phone data placing them close to the scene, and video of the getaway car. But, Pope said, they didn’t have a witness who could identify the shooters or explain the motives for the crimes.

Because witnesses are so fearful of retribution, such detailed testimony has become increasingly rare, she said. Which is why, when the 18-year-old came forward, she was heartened, she said — but also worried for him.

“This is life,” she said. “This is this kid’s life.”

The witness has only returned to Philadelphia twice since that day, his mother said, to testify in front of a grand jury against Curry and Sherman, and later to testify in the trial of Nolan, Crawford, and Miles.

Both times, his mother said, no one knew he was in town. She and her son stayed in hotels outside of the city under fake names. They didn’t even tell police where they were staying, she said, because they were afraid to trust anyone.

The process was financially and emotionally taxing. The city paid for their flights, the mother said, but she footed the bill for their hotel, food, rental cars, and related costs.

Once it was time to testify, they met detectives at police headquarters and were escorted to the courthouse. They were sneaked inside through the back entrances and protected hallways of the building.

When the witness finally entered the courtroom, he saw two relatives sitting in the spectator gallery — not there to support him, his mother said, but on behalf of the killers. He was crushed, she said.

Still, he took to the stand and told the jury exactly how Crawford described how he, Miles, and Nolan killed Pittman and Marks.

“Zaire told me that him, and Reek and Ya saw somebody walking and they all started shooting,” he said in Marks’ case.

Crawford, he said, told him they switched cars after killing Marks, and that once he saw Pittman, he ran up and fired at close range. The witness said that when he saw the police surveillance video of the shooting, he could tell it was Crawford by the shoes he was wearing and the way that he ran.

He told the jury that Crawford even detailed how many shots he fired in each shooting — how he had only three bullets left after killing Marks, and so once he found Pittman, he “had to make it count.”

His testimony proved to be crucial. Nolan and Crawford were convicted of first-degree murder in the deaths of Marks and Pittman, and sentenced to 35 years to life. Crawford’s lawyer, Jason Kadish, said he had appealed the conviction to Superior Court, and declined to comment. The Defender’s Association, which represented Nolan, also declined to discuss the case.

Yaseam Miles was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder for his role in Pittman’s death. He was sentenced to 20 to 40 years. His lawyer declined to comment.

Sherman and Curry ultimately pleaded guilty to killing Frazier and Johnson. Sherman, as the getaway driver, was sentenced to 12½ to 25 years — a lesser sentence, in part, because Pope did not want to risk bringing the witness into town to testify a third time, she said. Curry, who also pleaded guilty to killing 19-year-old Sidney Sessoms in the front door of his home, is awaiting sentencing.

In the aftermath of the trial, the witness fell into a depression, his mother said. For weeks, he barely left his room or got out of bed, overwhelmed by a feeling that he had betrayed his family and grieving the loss of his relationship with relatives in Philadelphia. Frightened for his life, he got a license to carry a gun and has deleted all social media because he was getting trolled by the gangs.

In recent months, his mother said, he’s doing better. He’s living on his own and is considering a career in law enforcement or the military, she said. Still, she suspects that he doesn’t understand the impact his decision to testify had on so many peoples’ lives, particularly the victims’ families.

Emily Johnson, K.J.’s mother, began to cry when thinking about the young man — whom she has never met and probably never will.

“I want him to know I love him with every bit of love I have left,” she said. “I love him and I thank him, and K.J. loves him.”

Tommie Frazier’s mother, Brenda Barksdale, said she is eternally grateful. And Shani Pittman, Kanye Pittman’s mother, said the risk he took is not lost on her.

“I felt like he was everything I needed,” Pittman said. “At that point in time, he was a hero to me.”

His testimony not only helped multiple families secure justice, but also meant that some of the most prolific shooters in the city are now off the streets. Pope and Carr suspect that the defendants were tied to several other shootings. The vast majority of YBC’s members were now either dead — shot and killed in the same cycle of retaliation — or in jail, they said.

“He brought the group to its knees,” Carr said of the witness.

The rate of shootings in Philadelphia has fallen dramatically after peaking in 2021. So far this year, the city has recorded about half as many homicides compared with the same time that year. And although it’s hard to know why, some, such as Pope, think the recent arrests of people in violent gangs in the city — from YBC, to 02da4 in Southwest and PNB in Northwest — have played a role.

“It goes to show you the impact of putting the right people in jail,” she said.

YBC members have noticed. A month after Nolan was convicted, he posted a new song to his Instagram from jail, with the caption, “f— ‘cydney pope.’”

“Gave me life,” he rapped from his cell, “but I took many of ‘em.”