Members of a notorious London gang who plotted to gun down a rival rapper and flooded the city with drugs have been pictured throwing gun signs in a boastful photo behind bars.
The Harrow Road Boys wreaked havoc in the Mozart Estate ‘and beyond’ as they engaged in a tit-for-tat postcode war with the CGM (Cherish God More) gang, which would eventually see them attempt to hunt down and shoot rival rapper Digga D.
The war between the feuding gangs began when a member of the HRB, which flooded the streets of west London with drugs and enlisted children to expand their operation, was shot for entering the rival gang’s territory.
Their bloody feud escalated to Jayvon Tison, also known as Lil Dotz, ‘lead[ing]’ the search for the drill rapper, and sending out a list of rival gang members to target after his brother Daneche, 26, was shot in the heart outside a block of flats in west Kilburn.
This August, seven members of the gang – including Tison – were jailed for a total of 116 years for conspiracy to possess firearms with the intent to danger life, for smuggling phones into London prisons, and other drug offences.
A fellow member of the group and rapper, Marvin William Bailey – better known by his stage name of Fredo – was also named as a conspirator in the trial. However, he failed to appear, with the court being told he is believed to be living abroad.
Now the Daily Mail can exclusively reveal members of the gang, who were described as a ‘blight on their community’ due to drug dealing and the serious violence they caused, arrogantly pose for a group photo on a prison yard.
Herman Yikalo, 31, can be seen casually leaning against the prison yard fence alongside three unidentified men throwing up gun signs towards the camera.
Tison, 24, who had added status within the brutal gang due to being a ‘successful recording artist in his own right’, can be seen crouching down in front of the four men wearing a dark grey tracksuit.
Earlier this year, HRB members – Tison, Kylann Grannum, Mustafa Abdalla, Romello Briggs–Leon, Harry Crump, Yasin Abdulla and Herman Yikalo – were found guilty for conspiracy to possess a firearm with intent to endanger life.
Abraham Safo Frimpong was found not guilty of the charge, but was found guilty of contravening the Prisons Act, by smuggling phones behind bars.
At the sentencing in Kingston Crown Court, it was heard how Tison lead the search for Digga D, whose rap songs glorifying violence and goading rivals has seen him dubbed ‘London’s most hated rapper’ due to his long list of enemies.
The first killing in between the warring gangs happened in July 2020, when Billy McCullagh, known as Billy da Kid, was gunned down by rival gang members in Harlesdan, with Jeffrey Wegbe, 26, shot and killed in Kilburn just a month later.
Tison ‘glorified’ Wegbe’s death in a video for a drill rap song titled ‘Roll Up’, where he bragged about taking a dead person’s ashes and rolling them up into a cigarette as a sign of disrespect.
But the postcode rivalry came to a head when the criminal’s older brother and only remaining sibling, Daneche, was gunned in the heart outside a block of flats in 2022.
In turn, this sparked Tison to send a target list of rival gang members, as well as ‘leading’ the hunt for Digga D, who he and his six accomplices intended to ’cause significant harm’.
The 24-year-old also abused a woman, who he referred to as ‘a deeme’ in Snapchat correspondence, to store a firearm before paying a £500-a-month ‘lock’ to hold the weapon.
On October, 24, 2022, police found two guns in a bag in a service cupboard next to a flat on the Mozart estate which were forensically linked to Tison and Grannum. A month later they also found a gun hidden in a panel in a tower block in Vauxhall.
The guns included a firearm used to shoot at a group of CGM gang members in 2022, and which they hoped to use to gun down Digga D.
The gang, who acted ‘above the law’, replaced the firearms after police had found them locked away.
But their crimes weren’t only exclusive to violence, with members of the gang involved in smuggling phones into prisons across London using drones, which in turn were used by prisoners to order illicit substances and tobaccos.
Police Constable, Davice Hammond, told the court how the gang wreaked havoc on the Mozart estate ‘and beyond’, with locals afraid to leave their own home and one abandoning their tenancy entirely out of fear.
Children were recruited by the gang to expand the drug dealing operation outside of the capital, with offences by the Harrow Road Boys leaving the community in fear of ‘when the next attack will be.’
‘Gang violence has been a ward priority for several years. This is without a doubt the issue that concerns my residents the most,’ the statement from the officer read.
‘The hardest thing I have had to do is to deal with families who have lost their children to gang violence.’
He added that gang violence ‘destroy[s] the lives of entire families in split seconds,’ and that the network ‘need[s] to be broken before another person is killed.’
At their sentencing on August 18, Judge Marcus Tregilgas–Davey said the gang was ‘involved in a long running and deadly rivalry with CGM including ‘a long series of shootings and violent reprisals.’
He added: ‘The rivalry was further fuelled by tension between prominent members of the HRB CGM gangs, Fredo, and Digga D.
‘One of the guns used by the HRB gang had been discharged. The firearm was recovered by police on a beach three days later.
‘The gang used a woman to store the firearm. A conversation recovered in a Snapchat group chat also showed how the gang discussed buying a lock for the gun.
‘There were fatal shootings throughout 2022 in the Harrow area, and at the same time, there were videos of the CGM gang taunting their rivals and claiming responsibility for the violent attacks.
‘The HRB gang actively searching for Digga D in what in my view was clearly going to be a hit involving a firearm after they learnt about his whereabouts in a music video in central London.
‘There was significant planning. There was the use of a female to move the firearm around, and a youth to store the firearm and ammunition at an address in Harrow.
‘It is also clear that there were significant discussions about sourcing locks for the guns on Snapchat.
‘The gang posed a high risk due to the firearms, but there was also a high risk of disorder, as a hit on Digga D would have inevitably led to repercussions from CGM.’
The judge added that the defendants were ‘immersed in gang culture and violence’ adding:
‘You were living in the shadows of civilised society.’
‘Not one of you have shed an ounce of remorse for what you have done,’ he said.
‘The truth is that you as members of the HRB are a blight on your own community.’
Tison of Westminster, Mustafa Abdallah of Kensington and Chelsea, Briggs–Leon of Westminster, Yasin Abdulla of Kensington and Chelsea, Yikalo of Westminster, and Grannum of no fixed address were sentenced to 17 years behind bars for conspiracy to possess firearms with intent to endanger life and conspiring to contravene the Prisons Act by supplying phones to people in jail, with the sentences running concurrently.
Crump of Westminster was jailed for 14 years for conspiracy to possess firearms with intent to endanger life, while Safo Frimpong, Westminster, was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for conspiracy to contravene the Prisons Act.
Detective Sergeant Cassie Hazell, who led the investigation, said: ‘This trial has brought to light the true nature of criminal gangs intent on bringing violence, intimidation and lawlessness to this city’s streets.
‘This gang thought they were acting above the law and obtained lethal weapons they planned to use in attacks against rival factions.
‘Officers were able to pick their plan apart through months of tireless investigation, including the identification of high-ranking gang members, the analysis of more than 100 phones and tackling the suspects of crime head on. We’re treating organised crime gangs like terrorists, employing similar tactics to disrupt their activity.
‘That eight men have now been taken off the streets is a testament to how officers are taking the fight to organised crime networks.
‘But we cannot do this alone. If you are aware of criminal activity in your area, please contact police on 101 or anonymously through Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.’
A Prison Service spokesperson said: ‘We are aware of these videos and have requested their removal.
‘Any offender caught using a phone or social media in prison will face punishment, which could include additional time behind bars.’