Drill rapper jailed for life after murdering YouTuber at snake video shoot

A gangster rapper has been jailed for life for murdering a social media star at a music video shoot that featured live reptiles.

Ellis Heather was sentenced to a minimum of 28 years behind bars after being found guilty at the Old Bailey last month of killing Stephen Morrisson in an Essex car park in June 2020.

Morrisson, 30, who regularly posted content on YouTube and Snapchat, was fatally stabbed in the chest in Epping after he stumbled into a video shoot featuring snakes and a Komodo dragon, irritating the filming crew and appearing to drive at them.

Drill rapper Heather, who also goes by the name Rack5 and Racks LC, was one of the organisers of the production and after the killing, he partied with friends as they listened to tracks by the victim's brother Morrisson.

Stephen Morrisson, known as Zero Ls, had appeared in his sibling's videos, making the sign of a zero and L, which stands for zero losses.

Heather, 25, went on to rap about the murder with the lyrics: "OL got wet and he's dead [wet, wet, wet, wet]," jurors were told.

The trial heard Heather and fellow drill rapper Yonas Girma, who was cleared of murder by the jury, had been involved in "carefully planned" arrangements for the video.

A videographer, technical assistants, models and extras were gathered along with live reptiles to be used as "props" in the shoot on 23 June 2020.

The group of men and women had gone to two filming locations in Essex, including the Wake Valley car park, where their paths crossed with Mr Morrisson in a Vauxhall Corsa.

At 7.34pm, one of the women in the filming group was pictured with a large snake around her neck.

Minutes later, Mr Morrisson was fatally stabbed and died in hospital, while defendants Heather, from Slough, Berkshire, and Mr Girma, from Feltham, west London, had left the scene.

Days afterwards, a woman who had been on the shoot called police and said Mr Morrisson had appeared "weird" and "very loud", and banged his head on a large tree.

She said he went on to "drive at" members of the group, forcing them to jump back with the defendants.

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The witness, who had a brief relationship with Heather, recalled Mr Morrisson appeared to be drunk and did a "couple of circles" of a tree before driving towards them.

She said the victim appeared as if he was going to run them over or "scare them" but braked hard and fast.

Heather swung his arm towards Mr Morrisson, although the witness did not see a knife, the court heard.

The woman later went with Heather to a rural area where it was alleged he disposed of the murder weapon and then threw a blood-stained cloth from the car.

Travelling at up to 70mph, he became ill, told her to take the wheel and was sick out of the window, she said.

Asked why he was feeling unwell, he told the woman "this is my first M", said to be slang for murder.

Stephen Morrisson's mother Lorraine read a family statement, which said: "Steve was a son, a brother, a dad and an uncle.

"Every day we try to keep his memory alive so that his young son, nieces and nephews never forget him, because memories are all we now have left."

(c) Sky News 2026: Drill rapper jailed for life after murdering YouTuber at snake video shoot