NEW YORK – The founder of Czar Entertainment, James Rosemond, also known as “Jimmy the Henchman,” who found guilty of murder-for-hire, will be sentence in January, according to officials.
He is facing a life sentence, officials said.
The jury convicted ROSEMOND last week of conspiracy to commit murder for hire and firearms offenses for order the murder of Lowell Fletcher, according to authorities.
According to court papers and the evidence admitted at trial:
Rosemond was the founder of Czar Entertainment, a rap music management company, and also the head of a large-scale cocaine trafficking organization.
In 2007, members and associates of a rival rap group known as “G-Unit” – including Marvin Bernard, a/k/a “Tony Yayo,” and his associate Lowell Fletcher, a/k/a “Lodi Mac” – assaulted Rosemond’s son.
Rosemond’s son was not seriously injured in the assault, and Fletcher ended up serving prison time for his involvement in the assault.
Nevertheless, Rosemond recruited a crew of men to murder Fletcher upon his release from prison by promising the men at least $30,000 in payment for killing Fletcher, court documents indicate.
Rosemond had developed criminal relationships with these men through his involvement in the cocaine trade.
At Rosemond’s direction, members of the murder crew selected a dark and quiet location for the murder in the vicinity of Mount Eden and Jerome Avenues in the Bronx, and lured Fletcher to that spot.
When Fletcher arrived there in the evening on September 27, 2009, a member of the murder crew stepped out of the shadows and fired five bullets into Fletcher’s back using a .22 caliber handgun with a silencer, according to the evidence.
Fletcher died later that night.
On October 2, 2009, Rosemond had a trusted employee of his cocaine organization provide a kilogram of cocaine – worth about $30,000 in street value – as payment for the murder, officials said.
At the conclusion of Rosemond’s first trial earlier in 2014, a mistrial was declared because the jury was not able to reach a verdict.