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Reports of Shots Fired at Lil Wayne’s Miami Mansion, Just a Swatting Hoax

Miami Beach Police descend on La Gorce Island property, find absolutely nothing after tense intervention

Mar 12, 2015 10:04 GMT  ·  By
Lil Wayne becomes the latest target of a swatting hoax
   Lil Wayne becomes the latest target of a swatting hoax

Lil Wayne’s mansion on La Gorce Island has been raided by police for the second time in less than 2 weeks, this time for no good reason at all: the rapper has become the target of another one of those costly, ultimately dumb swatting hoaxes.

Miami Beach Police received a call over the non-emergency line that shots had been fired at the rapper’s house, CBS Local reports. SWAT and canine units were dispatched immediately.

No armed confrontation took place, Lil Wayne wasn’t even there

Word of the police intervention spread like wildfire on social media long before authorities had the chance to determine that the call had, in fact, been a hoax. At the same time, fans worried about the rapper, especially since this was the second time in 2 weeks something like this happened.

The first time was when a female fan managed to break inside the home when Lil Wayne was out. Apparently, she was willing to do whatever just to get him one on one.

Within minutes of the call, officers with bulletproof vests and heavy weaponry, and K9s, and a SWAT team were on the scene. Eyewitness describe the scene to CBS Local as one ripped out of an action movie.

However, once they got inside the house, officers established that no shots had been fired, which meant that this had been another one of those swatting calls: prank calls made to elicit a police intervention, preferably with a SWAT team. This is why they’re called “swatting” hoaxes.

In the tweets below, you will find confirmation from the Miami Beach Police that this was a swatting hoax, as well as from Lil Wayne and the official Twitter feed for Young Money Records. According to that last one, the rapper wasn’t even at home when this went down: apparently, he was in the studio, recording.

Not the first, probably not the last

As it happens, Lil Wayne isn’t the first and will probably not be the last celebrity to get swatted. Before him, other stars went through similar experiences and made headlines for it.

Tom Cruise, Kim Kardashian and her entire family, Justin Bieber, Chris Brown and Diddy had the police banging on their door after a prankster called 911 to report that a crime was underway in their homes.

Prank callers who find this type of hoax funny should think twice before dialing, though: the calls are recorded and can be traced back to them. Interventions of this type are a drain on taxpayers’ money, and on police officers’ time and efforts. They’re just not funny.