A Tennessee man pleaded guilty Friday to helping two other men charged with fatally shooting rapper Young Dolph in a daytime ambush at a Memphis bakery.
Jermarcus Johnson, 26, pleaded guilty to three counts of accessory after the fact. Judge Lee Coffee approved a plea deal with prosecutors, allowing him to avoid trial. He could testify at a future trial in the November 2021 killing of Young Dolph, whose real name was Adolph Thornton Jr.
Johnson is the first of four defendants to plead guilty or be convicted in the Young Dolph shooting, which rattled Memphis and shook the entertainment world. The 36-year-old rapper, label owner and producer was buying cookies near his boyhood home in Memphis when he was gunned down by two men who drove up to the bakery in a stolen Mercedes Benz, authorities said.
Johnson acknowledged helping the two shooting suspects communicate by cellphone after the killing while they were on the run from authorities and helping one of them communicate with his probation officer after the killing.