A suspect in the murder case of rapper Young Dolph has gone missing after he was released from prison.
Dolph was shot and killed in Memphis on November 17, 2021. According to eyewitnesses, the 36-year-old musician was shot through the window of a bakery, Makeda’s Homemade Butter Cookies. A private funeral was held on November 30, before a section of a street in the neighbourhood he grew up in was renamed in his honour on December 15.
28-year-old Shundale Barnett was arrested last month in connection with the case, and was charged as an accessory to Dolph’s murder. After being released from custody on January 21, Barnett has disappeared and is wanted by the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office, with an arrest warrant being issued, WREG report (via Complex).
Clay County Sheriff Paul Harden said: “On Jan. 11, Mr. Shundale Barnett was brought to the Clay County Jail by the Indiana State Police from an arrest on I-70. He was booked in the Clay County Jail on an outstanding warrant from Shelby County, Tennessee.
“We contacted Shelby County and held him on their warrant. And we were contacted on Jan. 21 and they told us that they were no longer wanting to come and pick up Mr. Barnett and that we were to release him at that time.”
Asked why he was released from prison last month, Shelby County District Attorney General Amy Weirich said: “I can’t [answer], because it’s a pending case. It is a pending investigation, it is a pending prosecution, and we can’t get into that at this time. When we can, we will answer all those questions that I know the public has.”
Barnett was the third individual to be charged in relation to Young Dolph’s death. Justin Johnson, one of two people to be charged in early January, was arrested after a lengthy search by Memphis police and US Marshals. A warrant had been posted in January, co-signed by the Memphis Police Department, offering a $15,000 reward for information that would lead to his arrest. It’s reported Johnson had fled to Indiana – some 500 miles from the area that Dolph was killed in – with one of over 500 tips leading authorities to him.
Johnson and Cornelius Smith are both currently being held in police custody, facing charges of first-degree murder and theft of property between $10,000 and $60,000.
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