Image of Lil ‘Kleine as a street girl has now been completely overshadowed by violence

Rapper Lil ‘Kleine had just received a judicial conviction for assault, when he committed the wrong two days later.

It can be seen in video footage that appeared on social media last Sunday evening. A security camera, somewhere in the center of Amsterdam, records how Lil Kleine – real name Jorik Scholten – violently drags a woman out of the car and apparently smashes her head in with a car door. The woman turns out to be his girlfriend Jaimie Vaes, stylist and social media influencer, and mother of their two-year-old son.

The shocking images had only just reached social media, including calls to cancel the rapper for good, when it was reported that Lil Kleine has been arrested by the police. The rapper, who is not accused of violence against his girlfriend for the first time, seems to have to answer to a judge again for his structurally violent behavior.

Turbulent life course

The 27-year-old Lil ‘Kleine had a turbulent life so far. He was born on the Nieuwmarkt in Amsterdam. After the divorce of his parents, he moved to Amsterdam-East at the age of seven with his father. The bond with his father is close, but he soon doesn’t want to know anything about his mother. Why exactly is unclear. ‘You don’t do those things with a child,’ said Lil ‘Kleine earlier about his mother, ‘at all with no one and certainly not with your own child.’

Despite that difficult start, Lil’ Kleine turns out to be a creative and ambitious child, who loves rapping and acting, and wants to make something big for each other. He has small acting roles on TV and when he is ten he is taken under the wing of the biggest rap duo of the moment, the Diemense Lange Frans and Baas B. signs – against the youth news†

Outside the studio, Lil’ Kleine is doing a little less well. He is in special education, at a school for very difficult children, from which he is expelled. He is also sent away from plumber training after a fight, he says in an interview with the magazine JFK† “I used to mess up the whole class at 9:00 AM.”

Still, the rapper continues to chase his dream. On his first album Scum from 2012, the 17-year-old immediately sets the tone. ‘Smoking, drinking, fighting, stealing, I don’t give a damn.’ More and more often the young artist himself is booked.

The real breakthrough follows in 2015, when Lil ‘Kleine is under contract with TopNotch, the most famous hip-hop label in the Netherlands. Together with his fellow rapper Ronnie Flex, he scores a resounding success with the song Drink & Drugs†

In the years that followed, Lil ‘Kleine managed to distinguish itself as a hit machine with songs such as newspaper district† Little tiredand sensitive songs like closer to you† The rapper is a celebrity with millions of streams on Spotify and is a recurring topic of conversation with RTL Boulevard†

Violence

At the same time, the dark side of Lil ‘Kleine appears more often. He regularly interacts with small and large criminals, and makes no secret of it on social media. In 2018, during a night out in an Amsterdam disco, Scholten attacks a young man together with two friends, apparently out of nowhere. They kick and punch him repeatedly. Last Friday, Lil ‘Kleine was sentenced to 120 hours of community service.

Last summer, Lil ‘Kleine was also in the news because of an alleged violent incident. The rapper is said to have assaulted his girlfriend Jaimie Vaes until bleeding in a hotel on the Spanish island of Ibiza. Although Lil’ Kleine was arrested by the local authorities, the case was dropped after two days. The day after, Lil ‘Kleine and Jaimie Vaes came with a remarkable video message in which they swore that there is nothing going on between the couple. Vaes: ‘We hope to ask you with this: leave it alone.’

Unpalatable, many women in and around the hip-hop scene found the violence of Lil’ Kleine and the silence of fellow rappers that followed. How can an influential rapper like Lil’ Kleine get away with this misconduct? They found a photo that Lil ‘Kleine shared on Instagram after the incident was extra wry. He can be seen on it with Kees de Koning, founder of TopNotch, and with Vincent Patty, who is in charge of the record label’s daily management. They are sitting grey, and with bare chest, somewhere on the sun-drenched Ibiza. Lil’ Kleine holds up his middle finger at the camera. Obvious message: to hell with your concerns about the alleged misconduct of the Netherlands’ most successful rapper.

TopNotch protects ‘toxic men’ too much, journalist Jill Mathon, among others, argued in an opinion piece in The Parool† The same anger and call for consequences echoed last Sunday night. The difference now is that this act of violence by Lil ‘Kleine occurs at a time when a major reckoning is underway with men who are guilty of all kinds of transgressive behaviour.

Several celebrities have since distanced themselves fiercely from the rapper. Radio station FunX has decided to stop playing his music. It is now waiting for what his new record label Sony Music will do. At the time of this newspaper going to press, they were still preparing a statement.