Of Course Tekashi 6ix9ine Is Going Back to Jail

Photo: Jefferson Siegel/NY Daily News via Getty Images

Tekashi 6ix9ine was hit with a 45-day jail sentence on November 12 after admitting to violating his probation by skipping drug treatment, taking bootleg Adderall, and leaving South Florida without permission. The “Gummo” rapper, whose legal name is Daniel Hernandez, will spend slightly less time behind bars, however, as Judge Paul Engelmayer is applying time served since his October 29 arrest to this punishment.

Hernandez was also sentenced to an additional year of supervised release. He is being ordered to spend his first two months out of jail largely at home, so nobody will be subjected to a live performance anytime soon. He’ll also be on a curfew for one month after his stint at home wraps.

Before Engelmayer handed down his sentence, Hernandez asked for leniency, pointing to how he has been stuck in solitary confinement since his arrest. In Brooklyn federal jail, the warden told him that he would be in special housing throughout his time there. Both the Manhattan federal prosecutor and Hernandez’s attorney, Lance Lazzaro, told Engelmayer about the Bloods gang members currently incarcerated there. Prosecutors had recommended 30 days of incarceration for the probation violations in addition to the home confinement and year of probation post-release.

Hernandez asked for the judge’s mercy, saying he felt “disappointed” in himself for returning to jail.

“I did four years and seven months faithfully under supervision, no problem, and I’m not minimizing my actions. I fully take responsibility,” he continued. Hernandez admitted that he let himself and his family down and reflected on his past bad judgment. He didn’t want Engelmayer to “get the wrong impression” and think of him as “ill-mannered.”

“I don’t want to go back to the box, and I know that I have no choice [but] to go back to the box,” he said, saying shortly thereafter, “Please have mercy on my sentence, and I’m sorry.”

Hernandez, who appeared in dark-colored jail scrubs, appeared to show little emotion as he made his pitch for a lesser sentence. As Engelmayer handed down his sentence, the judge said that he had planned on issuing a sentence that was longer than prosecutors’ recommendation. In his view, Hernandez just kept messing up.

“You told me that you’d grown up; you told me that you had matured,” Engelmayer said, referring to Hernandez’s sentencing proceeding more than five years ago. “The bottom line is that I see a pattern here,” he said, adding that despite Hernandez being a “famous” rapper, the same rules apply to him as anyone else.

In February 2019, Hernandez copped to nine federal counts after his racketeering arrest in November 2018 stemming from his involvement in the Nine Trey Bloods gang. Hernandez, who had been facing 47 years to life behind bars, brokered a plea deal and  prosecutors agreed to request a sentence below any mandatory minimum if he cooperated with them.

And cooperate he did: Hernandez testified against two ex-associates in September 2019 in the racketeering trial against Nine Trey Gangsta Bloods members Anthony “Harv” Ellison and Aljermiah “Nuke” Mack. While Hernandez was on the stand, he dropped so many dimes that the #HernandezSnitch9 hashtag started trending. He snitched on members from street-level gangsters to high-profile musicians, going so far as to claim that Cardi B and Jim Jones were in the Bloods and Nine Trey, respectively.

He was ultimately sentenced to 24 months in prison and five years of supervised release in December 2019 with the caveat that he would be released late in 2020 with time served. Hernandez was released in the spring of 2020, however, as the COVID-19 pandemic enabled some inmates with health issues to leave prison early under “compassionate release.” Hernandez’s probation was supposed to be up this December. So had he just followed the rules for less than two more months, he would have been free to terrorize everyone with his music. Alas, it’s hard to teach a middling rapper new tricks.