Snoop Dogg 1993
Vintage Cap

On 25 August 1993, 21-year-old Calvin “Snoop Doggy Dogg” Broadus turned himself in to LAPD detectives after a rival gang member, Philip Woldemariam, was shot dead outside Snoop’s Palms apartment complex.

Prosecutors charged both Snoop and his bodyguard McKinley “Malik” Lee with first-degree murder, alleging the fatal shot was fired from the Jeep Snoop was driving. At booking the rapper wore a striped rugby shirt and stared down the camera beneath the slate “BK 3670846 08-25-93”—the image that would grace posters, album art and, eventually, T-shirts.

Released on $1 million bail, Snoop appeared two nights later at the MTV Video Music Awards, then poured his anxiety into the single “Murder Was the Case,” foreshadowing a courtroom drama that dragged on for two-and-a-half years.

The televised trial finally ended on 20 February 1996, when a Los Angeles jury acquitted both men of all murder and conspiracy counts. The verdict freed Snoop just as his debut album Doggystyle was cementing him as the new face of West-Coast rap, transforming the stark black-and-white mugshot from potential career-ender into an icon of hip-hop resilience.