Dark Lo has been sentenced to seven and a half years behind bars.
The Philadelphia rapper—legal name Charles Salley—received his sentencing on Friday, months after he pleaded guilty to one count of witness intimidation in a federal drug case. The 39-year-old artist admitted to writing a letter to Dontez “Taz” Stewart, a government informant who testified against Abdul “AR-Ab” West. AR-Ab, who co-founded Original Block Hustlaz with Dark Lo, received a 45-year prison sentence back in April for allegedly running a drug trafficking ring that was linked to multiple murders.
According to prosecutors, Dark Lo had sent an intimidating letter to Stewart on the eve of his testimony. The letter, which was sent under Dark Lo’s alias “Ron Harvey,” warned Stewart that if he took the stand, he might get stabbed in prison. The message also included threatening statements against Stewart’s girlfriend.
Dark Lo, however, insisted he never intended to threaten the witness, and was simply trying to warn him about the potential consequences of taking the stand.
“Imagine agreeing to be a federal witness against members of a violent drug gang and the day before you take the stand, one of their buddies threatens you and yours,” Michael J. Driscoll, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI’s Philadelphia Division, said in a press release. “This is exactly the type of thing our witness tampering laws are designed to prevent, as our justice system depends on witnesses being willing to share what they know. The FBI simply will not permit them to be targeted like this, in an attempt to subvert the rule of law. Charles Salley was hoping to keep his OBH associates out of prison. Instead, he finds himself behind bars as well, for quite some time.”
Dark Lo touched on the case during an exclusive interview with Complex earlier this year, denying allegations he, too, had snitched on AR-Ab.
“… Why would I get locked up for writing a message to some guy that was like my little brother, and the guy gave the letter to the Feds and I got pickled?” he said about Stewart. “Dude was just basically… It always comes from the inside, it always comes from family. It ain’t coming from nowhere else but from family. You know jealousy, n***as hatin’ … You’ve got to understand, I write a letter to somebody that’s testifying on my brother, and I get picked up. I talked to the cops, whatever, I’m trying to get him out. I’m trying to make it smooth for Ab.”
According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, Dark Lo was also sentenced to one year of supervised release and was ordered to pay a $10,000 fine.
