Holdin' Down The Culture
He may be known as a Grime rapper but he certainly seems to enjoy grimy sex. British rapper Solo 45 (legal name: Andy Anokye), 32, was found guilty in a Bristol, England Crown Court this week of repeatedly raping and torturing four women.
According to British daily The Guardian, Solo 45 was found guilty of 30 charges in total which took place over a two-year period, including 21 counts of rapes, five counts of false imprisonment, two counts of assault by penetration and two of assault occasioning actual bodily harm. Solo 45 claims all the women involved were willing participants in what the Grime rapper called “rape game.”
Prosecutor Christopher Quinlan QC told the jury Solo 45 was “a narcissist and a violent bully,”, and further qualified his accusations by stating, “Not one of the women from whom you have heard said that they consented to what he says is a game – the ‘rape game.’ They marked a boundary and he trashed it because he doesn’t recognize boundaries, either for himself or others.”
The women, who reportedly never knew each other before their experiences with Solo 45, all described similar instances with the rapper, which included weapons, being held against their will, having cloth with bleach applied forcibly to their face and waterboarding in addition to having much of “rape game” incidents filmed of the rapper’s cell phone.
Solo 45’s lawyer, Sally O’Neill, claimed the videos film on her client’s cell phone (and which were viewed in court) showed “rough, sometimes unpleasant but importantly, consensual sexual activity” and further attempted to assert that the alleged victims were “independent, adult women” who were operating on a “level playing field.”
After the trial, DCI Neil Rice of Avon and Somerset police stated, “I hope today’s verdicts bring some solace to the victims in this case who have suffered unimaginable horrors. Our focus will remain on supporting them as we have done for almost three years since this investigation began, and we will continue to do so through to sentencing and beyond.”
Solo 45 came up in the industry as a member of Boy Better Know, a British Grime collective and record label and rose to fame in 2014 with the track ‘Feed Em To The Lions.’ Over the course of his career, he’s performed with fellow Grime heavyweights including Stormzy, Skepta, Wiley and JME. A sentencing date will be set in the future and Solo 45 has been ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.
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