Troy Ave Sets Up Scholarship at High School He Went to With Banga

Last week, Troy Ave's lawyer, John Stella, announced that the Brooklyn rapper would be setting up an athletic scholarship at New Utrecht High School, where both Troy and the late Ronald "Banga" McPhatter attended high school together. Today at 1 p.m., the first New Utrecht student will be presented with a $2000 scholarship in McPhatter's name, according to Troy Ave's other lawyer, Scott Leemon.

McPhatter, a member of Troy's B$B crew, died in a shooting at Irving Plaza in late May. The scholarship will provide $2,000 a year to an exceptional individual for five years.

Troy was formally charged with attempted murder on May 30. However, many reports are beginning to state the charges could be updated to murder based on ballistics results that show the bullets that hit Banga match a gun found in Troy Ave's van.

On the music side of things, Troy recently released a new mixtape, aptly titled Free Troy Ave. Though the project includes several in-jail recordings, all 12 tracks are previously recorded and bear no relation to his current situation at Riker's Island.

In his review for XXL, Scott Glaysher writes, "Free Troy Ave works well for Troy for two big reasons. For starters, he gets a chance to share his side of the story everyone is talking about. It must be incredibly frustrating hearing all the falsified stories while behind bars with no real chance to defend yourself; so for that reason, the current updates are well received. Plus, it’s always good to have new music for fans to digest while away for an extended period of time."

Stay locked to XXL as more information surrounding the Troy Ave case begins to trickle out.

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