Ant "D" Revisited: Part 2 - The Murders

[Another two-parter. Click here to read Part 1 first.]

Ant "D" is currently on death row for the April 13, 1996 murders of University of Miami football player Marlin Barnes and Timwanika Lumpkins, also know as Lil Bit, who was Ant's former girlfriend and mother of his child (Ant thanks her in the Top Dog liner notes, as well as on previous Dogs' albums, and gives a creepy laugh after shouting out her name on "Ant 'D' Saying Whats Up"). Ant had been seeing Timwanika on and off for over five years ...along with University of Miami basketball player Jennifer Jordan; Watisha Wallace, mother of another one of his children, and Katina Lynn, a nude dancer who toured with the Dogs. At the time, Ant was living alternately with Watisha and Timwanika (when he was arrested two weeks after the murders, he was in bed with Watisha), and a week before the 13th, Timwanika walked out on him. Apparently, there had been several incidents of violence before with Timwanika over his jealousy.

In 1994, he threatened Timwanika and another man with a 9mm outside their home, and in 1995 went to her aunt's house with the same gun, looking for her. He threatened her as well as a man she was with, and hit him with the gun. In another scary '95 incident, Ant "D" was spotted hiding outside of Timwanika's house behind a tree, in a black outfit he wore for his stageshows. He later knocked on the door and threatened to "blow [the] brains out" of a man she was about to go out with. After a series of harrassing cell phone calls that same night, Timwanika wound up going out with Marlin instead of her intended date. Timwanika's high school friend Dekeisha Williams reported several incidents, from frightening phone calls to black eyes and "welts on her neck that looked like handprints."*

Katina had similar incidents with Ant "D" in the past. She testified about times when he grabbed her by the neck and banged her head against the wall, telling her "not to play with his feelings or he would hurt her." Another time, after running into her old high school teacher at the gym, Ant put a gun to her head and told her, "he had better not find out she was messing with someone else or he would kill her, put her body in a bag and throw her somewhere." And again, when she tried to leave him, he put a gun to her head and said she could never leave him and "if she tried, she would 'leave the world.' Then he told her to call him in the morning and don’t play with him.'

On Easter of '96, Ant "D" went to his friend Joseph Stewart's place looking to borrow a gun. Joseph had a broken shotgun he'd found in the trunk of an abandoned car a year earlier that he was keeping under his mattress at his mother's house, which he let him borrow. Katina then went with Ant to go buy bullets.

On April 12th, Timwanika went to a party for a charity basketball game with several girlfriends. Marlin was also there with friends, but they wound up leaving together. When they got outside, they discovered Timwanika's tires had been slashed.

On April 13th, Marlin's roommate and childhood friend, Earl Little, came home to his apartment to discover their door unlocked. When he tried to open the door, he found it was blocked and forced it partway to see a "floor full of blood" and his roommate Marlin lying on the floor, breathing hard. Earl called his name twice, and the second time Marlin turned his head just enough that Earl could see his face. In a 2005 interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Earl said, "He was still alive. I opened the door enough to stick my head in there and I said, 'Marlin.' He was trying to respond. It came out in the trial that the guy hit him 27 times with the butt end of a shotgun. His face was all messed up. It was best he passed away. When I found him, no surgery would have put him back to the way he was."

To quote the court documents exactly, "Marlin Barnes had suffered multiple lacerations all over his face and forehead, on both cheeks and on his lower lip, and had bruising on both cheeks and around his eyes. Barnes’ sinus and nasal bones were broken. His hard palate, or roof of his mouth, was broken, while several of his teeth were broken and missing. Barnes had some abrasions on the back of his head that were consistent with Barnes having been beaten while the back of his head was against carpet. There was also a laceration on the back of his head that was different than the ones on the front, which could have been caused by his falling to the floor and hitting his head, or by being hit on the front of his head as he lay on the hard surface of the floor. There was a "thin" fracture of the occipital bone underthis laceration.Barnes had defensive wounds on both his hands, corresponding in shape to parts of the shotgun... Barnes’ sinus and nasal bones were broken. His hard palate, or roof of his mouth, was broken, while several of his teeth were broken and missing."

Apparently, Ant assaulted and beat Marlin down as soon as he opened the door; then continued to beat him with the shotgun while he was on the floor. He then left Marlin and went to look for Timwanika. It's believed that some of Marlin's face wounds caused bleeding and hemorrhaging in and around his eyes; which left him blind as he attempted to walk around the apartment, ultimately collapsing against the door.

Tamwanika was also still alive when police found her, "lying face down next to the bed. She was 'gurgling' as if she were trying to breathe but her lungs were full of fluid. She had suffered obvious trauma to the back of her head; [Coral Gables police officer Dan] Oppert observed a great deal of blood and what appeared to be exposed brain matter." According to the physical evidence, Tamwanika was hiding under the bed and dragged out. She had defensive wounds on her arms and hands, including broken fingers and fingernails. Blood was even found sprayed on the ceiling. Tamwanika was airlifted to a nearby hospital where she soon died.

After the murder, Joseph found his shotgun returned but destroyed in the same duffel bag he'd lent to Ant "D" behind some bushes alongside his mother's driveway. Inside there was also a knife and Ant's black outfit. After talking to Ant the next day, Joseph disposed of the gun, knife and clothes, but "saved the duffel bag because he didn’t notice any blood on it, and planned on using it again." Police didn't find out about Joseph’s involvement until his girlfriend, Zemoria Wilson, told her bus driver about the incident on a return trip from Chicago.

Ant later saw Katina, told her conflicting stories about his whereabouts during the murder and told her, "That was good for her ass. The bitch shouldn’t have been cheating on me." He was finally arrested for the murders after a phone tip to the police on April 30, 1996. He was 24 at the time; Timwanika and Marlin were both 22.

There. I don't think another post on this blog will ever be as grim as that. This has to be the most brutal case in hip-hop (to date). To be fair to all parties, however, I should point out that Ant "D" did plead not guilty to the charges and I believe still maintains his innocence (the most recent information I could find was a denied appeal in 2002). Anyway, I promise the next post I make will be much more upbeat.

* By the way, pretty much all of the information and quotes in this half of the piece are coming from The Supreme Court of Florida's published statements (91 pages) of the case.

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