This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

A man has been charged with murder over the death of a London-based musician last week, police have said.

Kenneth Umezie, 31, is accused of killing Sidique Kamara, a 23-year-old drill rapper from Camberwell, in the south of the capital.

Kamara, who performed under the name Incognito with rap collective Moscow17, was found with stab wounds in a sidestreet at about 7.30pm on Wednesday 1 August. He died at the scene, Scotland Yard said.

He had previously spoken about the relationship between drill and violence, saying: “The crime that’s happening, right, music does influence it. You’ve got to put your hands up and say drill music does influence it.”

But he added: “Knife crime and gun crime has been going on way before drill music … 10 years, 20 years, people were still getting cheffed up [attacked with knives].

“There [are] many ways to solve it – you can bring out youth clubs, you can bring out many other things, invest money in other things to help the community, but you don’t want to do that – you just want to use an excuse with drill music.”

Umezie, who is also from Camberwell, is due to appear at Bromley magistrates court on Wednesday.

The Metropolitan police said three other teenagers, aged 16, 18 and 19, who were arrested as part of their murder inquiry, had been released under investigation.

Another member of the Moscow17 collective, 17-year-old Rhyhiem Ainsworth Barton, was fatally shot on the same street in May.

The group’s tracks have had hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube and include lyrics hostile to long-running rivals Zone 2, from Peckham.

Earlier this year, Kamara and another member of Moscow17 were cleared at the Old Bailey of murdering teenager Abdirahman Mohamed, a brother of a member of Zone 2.

This weekend, confectionery giant Mars pulled its advertising from YouTube after one of its brands was shown alongside drill rap videos linked to violent crime in the capital.