Chicago drill rapper BloodHound Q50 was laid to rest Friday in a private service attended by close family and friends.
Photos circulating online and shared by the podcast account No Jumper showed moments from the memorial. The service took place in Merrillville, Indiana, where Northwest Indiana police maintained a presence, according to local reporting.
Q50, whose full name was Mikquale T. Cooper, was 22. He was born Aug. 6, 2004, and raised in Chicago with part of his childhood spent in Northwest Indiana. His mother is Machetta Dudley.
Cooper was killed nearly two weeks earlier in a coordinated ambush. Shortly before 4 a.m. on Sept. 13, he sat in the driver’s seat of a white Tesla at the BP gas station at 4248 South Wentworth Avenue in Chicago’s Fuller Park neighborhood.
According to a preliminary Chicago Police Department report, two vehicles pulled alongside his car. Gunmen from both vehicles opened fire, discharging more than 50 rounds. Cooper was struck multiple times in the chest, shoulder, and other areas. He was pronounced dead at the scene or shortly after at the University of Chicago Medical Center.
Surveillance footage reviewed by officers showed assailants, several dressed in black and at least one in a green hoodie, fleeing south onto the Dan Ryan Expressway in a black sedan and a silver Honda Accord. A gun was recovered from Cooper, according to a law enforcement source. No arrests had been announced as of late September, and Chicago police detectives from Area One continued to investigate. No motive has been made public.
Cooper rose quickly in Chicago’s drill scene after starting to rap in 2023. Early tracks including “Big 3” and “Coffin” drew attention. He was associated with the BloodHound collective and often linked to his cousin, Bloodhound Lil Jeff, who was killed in 2024. Cooper released the project “Long Live My Brudda He Prolly Kilt Yo Brudda” and followed it with “Get Back or Die Trying” on his 22nd birthday in August 2026. He had appeared on stages including Rolling Loud and collaborated with artists such as EST Gee.
In interviews before his death, Cooper spoke about the risks of the lifestyle. He told DJ Akademiks he was not chasing death but was not running from it either, saying he knew what he had signed up for. His mother, Machetta Dudley, publicly addressed online mockery after the shooting, defending her son and warning critics while rejecting calls for a GoFundMe.
The private funeral marked the end of a short but rapidly rising career cut short by the same gun violence that has claimed many young artists in Chicago’s drill community. Chicago police continue to seek information on the shooting.
