Julio Foolio

Charles Andrew Jones II (June 21, 1998 – June 23, 2024), best known by his stage name Julio Foolio (shortened to Foolio), was an American rapper and gang member from Jacksonville, Florida, known for his role in both Jacksonville's burgeoning rap scene and gang wars, due to his feuds with fellow rappers and diss tracks directed at rival gangsters. He was shot and killed in a hotel parking lot in Tampa, Florida, on June 23, 2024.

Early life
Charles Andrew Jones II was born on June 21, 1998, in Jacksonville, Florida, where he grew up in the Moncrief neighborhood and was a member of the street gang KTA ("Kill Them All"). His father, Charles Andrew Jones, was murdered in a 2011 shooting in Jacksonville.

Career
Vulture described Foolio's 2019 mixtape Never Wanted Fame as "preoccupied with death and jail visits, ailing family members and creeping paranoia." Foolio released his debut album, Life of Me, in 2022. Two more albums, Final Destination (2023) and Resurrection (2024), followed before his death.

In 2017, Foolio's 18-year-old cousin, Zion Malik Brown, was shot and killed in his home. This is believed to have started the deadly gang war in Jacksonville, as rapper Yungeen Ace was wounded and three men killed in a 2018 retaliatory shooting, and Foolio posted derogatory content about the victims on social media.

Foolio was shot and wounded in July 2020 in Houston, Texas, and claimed in a November 2021 interview that he "shot back in self-defense. My gun is registered." On October 7, 2023, he was shot in the foot while driving in Jacksonville. In 2023, a former security guard for rapper NBA Youngboy stated during an interview that his client had an incident where Foolio and his group confronted him. According to Foolio in a 2021 DJ Vlad interview, unreleased Youngboy tracks were leaked online with the hashtag "#FOOLIODISS". In an April 2024 post to his Instagram account, Foolio commented on the "tragic [...] multiple attempts on my life."

Death
On June 23, 2024, two days after his 26th birthday, Jones was fatally shot and three other men were wounded after unknown assailants opened fire on them in the parking lot of a Holiday Inn in Tampa, Florida. He had been attempting to book a room in the hotel after he was asked to leave an Airbnb by authorities for exceeding occupancy limits.