Prosecutors cite gun photos in arguing rapper NBA Ben 10 should stay in custody

Federal prosecutors want NBA Ben 10 held until his trial, and the memorandum they filed in Louisiana four days after his first federal court appearance builds most of its case out of his own social media. The rapper's legal name is Benjamin Fields, and a Texas grand jury indicted him on 2 September for aiding and abetting a Hobbs Act robbery and brandishing a firearm during it.

The firearm count carries a legal presumption in favour of detention, which prosecutors acknowledged Fields can challenge at his bond hearing. Assistant US Attorney Nathan Munsell wrote that he "poses a grave danger to the community" and argued that no combination of release conditions would keep anyone safe.

The charges come out of a confrontation on 9 April with the Detroit rapper All-Star Jr., whose legal name is Jeremy Ford, inside the Confessions restaurant in Houston. Prosecutors say surveillance cameras recorded the whole dispute: a group approached Ford near an elevator, one associate pushed him and produced a pistol, and Fields can be seen taking the watch from his hand while another man held a pistol near his ribs. The filing says Fields removed a chain and put Ford in a chokehold that briefly left him unresponsive. Ford recovered a handgun dropped during the struggle and fired, and the shots left Fields paralysed and using a wheelchair. An indictment establishes nothing; the government still has to prove every count.

What the memorandum returns to repeatedly is Instagram. Prosecutors point to photographs posted after the shooting that appear to show Fields holding pistols and AR-style rifles, including an 8 August image where he smiles while pointing a black Glock at the camera. That one matters to them because, as they put it, it shows he retains the physical ability to brandish a handgun despite his injuries. Another image is said to show him handling money with a pistol and an extended magazine on his lap, a few feet from a child the filing describes as under four years old.

The government also tied the photographs to a separate shooting on 12 May near Nairn Drive and Wells Street in Baton Rouge, where officers recovered a tan Glock with a drum magazine that prosecutors compared with an earlier picture of Fields holding a similar weapon.

A section of the memorandum is given over to Never Broke Again. Prosecutors describe NBA as a well-heeled national organisation containing members known to the FBI for criminal activity, citing anticipated testimony from Supervisory Special Agent Jessica Sullivan, and identify NBA YoungBoy as its figurehead. The filing does not claim he personally directed the alleged robbery.

The record the government lists runs to six firearm arrests, six drug arrests, two arrests for fleeing police, and convictions involving prison contraband and supervised-release violations. Arrests are not convictions, a distinction the filing does not dwell on but which will matter at the bond hearing.

Because of the care his injuries require, prosecutors asked that he be detained inside an undisclosed Houston medical facility rather than an ordinary jail. No ruling has been reported. The case is one of several federal prosecutions running against figures in hip-hop this year, alongside the racketeering case against the Los Angeles music manager Big U.