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Ahbir Sardin, aka 'D.Rose,' Held on $1M Bail in Murder of Boy, 14: Sources

By  Erin Meyer and Erica Demarest | April 28, 2014 7:31am | Updated on April 29, 2014 8:47am

 A 17-year-old boy was charged with first-degree murder after the Feb. 12 shooting that killed Venzel Richardson.
Venzel Richardson
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CHICAGO — A Woodlawn teen charged in the February slaying of a 14-year-old boy goes by the street name "D.Rose" and is featured in lyrics by Chicago rappers Chief Keef, Cdai and RondoNumbaNine, sources say.

Ahbir Sardin, 17, who was charged over the weekend with the Feb. 12 shooting of Venzel Richardson, was ordered held on $1 million bail Monday.

Sardin goes by the name "D.Rose," sources said, and he appears in songs and videos by Chief Keef, RondoNumbaNine and Cdai. Sardin is a member of the Black Disciples street gang, according to sources. And the number "600" is tattooed on Sardin's wrist, a police report notes. That tattoo sometimes refers to the Black Disciples.

Venzel was walking with friends in the 6100 block of South Vernon Avenue on Feb. 12 when a white van pulled up, according to prosecutors. A shooter, later identified as Sardin by witnesses, opened the driver's side door and started firing, officials said.

Venzel was shot in his back, buttocks, left hip and neck, prosecutors said.

Sardin was previously falsely tied to the high-profile 2012 slaying of Chicago rapper Lil JoJo, whose real name was Joseph Coleman.

Lil JoJo had been feuding with the Black Disciples along with rival rappers Lil Reese, Lil Durk and Chief Keef for months before the murder, according to the Sun-Times.

Sardin was named last year on social media as 18-year-old Lil JoJo's killer. However, the owner of the Facebook page where the allegation was posted later said the account had been hacked.

Officials have not charged Sardin in connection with the case.

Reached by phone, a relative of Sardin said the teen wasn't involved in either murder.

"He didn't have anything to do with any of that," the relative said. "It was wrong then, and it's wrong now."  

In the murder of Venzel, Sardin has been charged as an adult. Venzel's family said the 14-year-old boy was a freshman at Dunbar Vocational Career Academy, and the night he was killed he had been heading to a corner store to buy chips and candy.

"I never wanted to be like the mothers on TV that are crying because their babies got shot," Venzel's mom, Laveta Richardson, said after the shooting. "And now I'm a victim. They shot my baby in the head."

Rapper Cdai — whose real name is Courtney Ealy, 19 — was charged with murder in the February shooting death of Javan Boyd, a 28-year-old livery driver gunned down on the job in Armour Square, police said. RondoNumbaNine — 17-year-old Clint Massey — has also been charged in that murder.