Man Convicted Of Murdering Pop Smoke Offers Apology To His Mother Years After The Tragedy

Forgiveness is an idea many peddle, but few embody, after all, is such a thing possible when discussing the brutal killing of New York’s next great hope, Pop Smoke.

The answer is unclear, but one of the men responsible for the rapper’s death would like his intentions stated on the record.

While doing an interview with XVTV, King Vermont Raskel, who was 15 at the time of murdering Pop Smoke during a robbery gone wrong along with four others, told the interviewer it was nothing personal.

“I’ll say an apology I never got to give was to Pop Smoke’s mom,” Raskel said. “I’ll say I never really got to apologize to her. And you know, an apology is not gonna change nothing and she probably don’t wanna hear it, but I always say the situation was never supposed to go like that. He’s not my enemy…what occurred was not personal.”

Raskel and four others were convicted of slaying Pop Smoke, though his sentencing was different because he was a minor. He spent four years in a juvenile facility before getting released in 2024. Previously, during an interview with No Jumper, he expressed no remorse, but has now changed his view.

Pop Smoke posted photos of gifts he received from a friend, one of which showed the full address of the Air BnB he was staying at. The five assailants entered the home at 4:30 A.M., in which a woman who was at the house spotted them and they held her at gunpoint, minutes later, one of the minors shot Pop Smoke dead, after he tried to rush them while stripping his jewelry. The intruders made off with his Rolex, which they sold for $2,000.