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West coast rapper MBnel returned to his hometown of Stockton, CA over the weekend to drop off a birthday gift for a friend’s two-year-old daughter. What was meant to be a quick exchange of love and happiness turned into one of the deadliest shootings the city has seen in years.
The gunfire erupted Saturday evening inside Monkey Space, a banquet hall just north of Stockton’s city limits, leaving a horrifying trail of casualties: 15 people wounded and four dead, including three children. Authorities later confirmed what locals already suspected—this was another eruption of gang-related violence in a city still struggling to contain it.
MBnel, born Johnel Dongon, was one of the victims. His father, Junior Dongon, says his son and daughter-in-law were both hit during the chaos.
“He was shot, but he is OK,” Dongon told reporters. “He just came to drop off a present… He called me and said, ‘Don’t say anything to anybody.’”
The fear isn’t new. Dongon says the family has lived under threat for years, recalling an incident where gunmen fired 22 rounds into his home, striking MBnel ’s wife in the hip. The rapper’s decision to leave Stockton and relocate to the Sacramento area two years ago came after surviving enough close calls to convince him that staying could be fatal.
Saturday’s shooting shook those fears back to the surface. According to the San Joaquin County Sheriff’s Office, the party was filled with children—some as young as nine—when the gunfire began just before 6 p.m. Deputies who rushed to the scene described victims scattered both inside the venue and across the street outside as frantic 911 calls flooded in.
Stockton Mayor Christina Fugazi later confirmed the city’s worst anxieties: “This was gang-related.”
For MBnel, the shooting is another grim reminder of why he left the place that shaped him. For Stockton, it’s another devastating example of the violence that continues to swallow its young.
As the community mourns, the rapper—one of the city’s most prominent musical voices—is once again in hiding, unsure when it will ever be safe to come home.
