Kyron Zarco died because gang members felt insulted

By Joe Johnson

Kyron Zarco will not get to have a fourth birthday party. He won’t ever kiss a girl on the playground.

Nor will the boy grow to become a teenager and then a man.

Kyron can never do or be anything anymore because he is dead.

According to police reports and court documents, the 3-year-old boy was fatally shot two months ago in his home because a family member who is a gang member had taken to social media to insult members of a rival gang.

That’s according to applications for warrants to search social media accounts of gang members

that police obtained during the investigation into Kyron’s death on March 8.

It was on that day the child had been inside his home at the Hallmark Estates trailer park, sitting next to his brother as they watched a movie on TV.

At the same time the child’s teenage stepbrother and a friend, both affiliated with a local street gang, were outside on the front porch.

When a Jeep approached and its occupants opened fire with semiautomatic weapons the two young men scurried uninjured to safety..

Though the hail of bullets missed its mark, some projectiles punched through the trailer’s wall and one struck Kyron in the chest, killing him, and another bullet struck his 9-year-old brother in the leg.

Athens-Clarke County police say the two young men who’d been targeted by the drive-by attack belong to RTG (Red Tape Gang), a local hybrid group that’s associated with the national Bloods gang.

Detectives learned that the Jeep that was used for the drive-by shooting had been occupied by four members of a gang that has been involved in a violent rivalry with RTG.

Authorities have identified that gang as EBE, or Everybody Eats.

The Georgia Attorney General's Office has described RTG as "a local hybrid criminal street gang with ties to major national Bloods, including Sex Money Murder and the Rollin’ 20s."

Through their investigation the Athens detectives were able to establish a motive for the deadly drive-by shooting: Kyron’s stepbrother had been “mocking dead EBE members,” including Ke'Trevian Cole, a 20-year-old rapper who had also been known as EBE Montana. Members of RTG felt “insulted” by the mockery, Athens police search warrants state.

Cole had once been considered to be the leader of RTG, but after a falling out with the group, he broke away to form the EBE gang.

Ke'Trevian Cole in his rap video “He Betta Run”

Authorities said Cole was killed in the early morning hours of May 2, 2021 when he was the passenger in a car on Ga. 316 in Barrow County, where another vehicle pulled alongside at a red light and its occupants opened fire, killing Cole and wounding the driver.

One of Cole’s raps is titled “He Betta Run,” which has lyrics that seem to mock someone who runs from a shooting.

The next life to be claimed by the deadly fued was that of 24-year--old Ja’ Vanni McDavid, a purported RTG affiliate.

He was fatally injured the night of March 5, 2023 in a drive-by shooting that targeted a house on Northview Drive in Five Points where police said a gang party was being held. More than 40 rounds reportedly were fired during an exchange of gunfire between occupants of a car and party attendees,

Three adult EBE members and one juvenile were later arrested for the deadly assault and subsequently indicted for murder, aggravated assault, and engaging in criminal street gang activity.

All four EBE members alleged to have been involved in the drive-shooting that killed Kyron have since been taken into custody and are being held without bail in pretrial detention.