Rapper MoneySign Suede killed in prison at age 22, officials say
Rapper MoneySign Suede was fatally stabbed in a California prison, authorities announced Wednesday.
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said in a statement that the artist, whose real name is Jaime Brugada Valdez, was not accounted for when Correctional Training Facility officers checked his cell during a nighttime count on Tuesday. The 22-year-old was found unresponsive in another area of the housing unit "with injuries consistent with a homicide," authorities said.
Staff attempted to revive him, but he died at the prison medical facility. Authorities did not reveal his injuries in the statement.
However, his attorney Nicholas Rosenberg told the Los Angeles Times that officials said his death was "a stabbing to the neck." Rosenberg also said the rapper was previously attacked before Tuesday's incident.
His death is under investigation.
Last December, Valdez was sentenced in Riverside County to serve two years and eight months for possession/owning firearm by felon or addict as a second-striker, according to officals. He was also serving a one-year, four-month sentence for possession/owning firearm with conviction of a violent felony, that was being served concurrently with his first conviction.
The rapper signed with Atlantic Records in 2021, according to the Los Angeles Times. Valdez, who is from Huntington Park, California, had more than 230,000 followers on Instagram and had more than 230,000 monthly listeners on Spotify. He released his most recent album "Parkside Baby" last year.