A war between West Coast and Midwest rappers is blamed for two murders in Las Vegas. The men's bodies were found in a neighborhood under construction in Southern Highlands on Monday. Now police are searching for three suspects.
Metro police raided a home Tuesday night, but the suspects already fled. The home is just blocks away from the murder scene.
Brandon Marx, a neighbor says, "I heard a lot of people saying, come out with your hands up." Marx was at his girlfriend's Southern Highlands home Tuesday night when he heard Metro's SWAT team knock down the neighbor's door.
Marx says, "I just went out to see and there were three SWAT guys behind the truck and they were telling us to go back in the house, go back in the house. So, we just went back in."
Police were looking for the renter, 24-year-old Jason Mathis, murder suspect, 34-year-old Andre Dow and 27-year-old Tanisha Aaron, the owner of the car where the two murdered men were found on Monday morning.
Dow, known as "Mac Minister," made headlines five years ago when he and another rapper brawled at the nationally televises Source Awards in Pasadena, California.
The bodies of the victims have been identified as 22-year-old Jermaine "Cowboy" Atkins and his best friend, 23-year-old Anthony Watkins, known as rapper, Fat Tone.
In his music, the Kansas City rapper documents the gang war between him and people associated with rapper Mac Dre from the San Francisco Bay area. Mac Dre was killed in a drive-by on a Kansas City highway last November. Rumor has been that Fat Tone was the shooter, but he was never arrested for the crime.
The victims' family says the two men were in town for a Snoop Dogg concert at the Palms Tuesday night. The family says that Mac Minister lured the two men to their death on Sunday night at the MGM Grand hotel by promising to hook them up with Snoop Dogg's record label. Instead they ended up dead in a Southern Highlands neighborhood.
Police have found the suspect's vehicle dumped in Vallejo, California.
Police found little furniture inside the home and believe that the three suspects are on the run in the Bay area now.
Sources at Metro say that the Snoop Dogg concert was almost canceled in fear of retaliation at the event. But a spokesperson at the Palms hotel says that wasn't true, and the concert went on as scheduled without any added extra security
