DaBaby Responds to Resurfaced Video of 2018 Shooting

After Rolling Stone resurfaced a 2018 video of DaBaby shooting 19-year-old Jaylin Craig in Walmart, the rapper went to Twitter to respond.

DaBaby has responded to a recently resurfaced video of him shooting 19-year-old Jaylin Craig at a North Carolina Walmart in 2018. On Monday, Rolling Stone published an investigative article about the 2018 incident, attempting to rebut the rapper’s claims that he was shooting in self-defense.

After the 2018 footage was released to the public, DaBaby – born Jonathan Lyndale Kirk – went to Twitter in an attempt to clear his name. Ebro in the Morning and The Ebro Show host Ebro Darden asked “Why are people acting like the 2018 video of Da Baby’s Walmart incident wasn’t already seen by Walmart, The Police and the courts?” In response, Kirk quote retweeted Darden, saying, “Cuz the media got they ass brainwashed.”

In the Rolling Stone article, the video shows Kirk instigating the fight, throwing the first punch and rushing Douglas, who Kirk interacted with at Walmart just minutes prior. Before the incident, Douglas and Craig were walking at Walmart when they ran into Kirk and his then-girlfriend Mariah Osbourne, attempting to get a closer look to verify if it was the rapper.

Taking offense at Douglas and Craig’s closeness, Kirk eventually proposed that the trio fight in the store’s parking lot. In the footage, Kirk is seen “unexpectedly launching into Douglas, striking him in the head and nearly tackling him to the ground.”

Craig stood near the two in the footage, and he’s seen reaching “into the front of his waistband to pull out what appears to be a firearm,” according to Mecklenburg County Assistant District Attorney William Bunting’s report.” Craig is then seen attempting to intervene with “his left hand between the fighting pair, as if to pull them off one another,” to which Osbourne jumped in, pushing and hitting Craig in the face.

When DaBaby broke free from the struggle, he withdrew a concealed .40-caliber Glock from his waistband, shooting Craig once in his side. Running into a nearby aisle, Craig is seen collapsing to the ground, being pronounced dead just minutes later. Since the shooting, Kirk has maintained his innocence. spoke about the shooting in various interviews, even referencing it in his 2020 hit “Rockstar” and in the music video for his 2019 song “Walker Texas Ranger.”

No stranger to controversy, after a homophobic tangent at Rolling Loud Miami in 2021, Kirk was dropped from festival slots at Lollapalooza and iHeartRadio Music Festival. Since the rant, it seems like music festival organizers have had a change of heart, adding him to Beale Street Music Festival and Rolling Loud Miami later this year.