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Birthday Party Fight, Triple Murder May Be Related

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By KEITH MORELLI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 27, 2008

TAMPA -- A dustup over music more than two weeks ago may be related to the triple homicide inside an Auburndale bar over the weekend, a shooting that claimed the lives of two Bay area DJs and another man who was tagging along with them at the show.

Antone Neely and Michael Rittigan made up the DJ duo that worked for Poison Dart, a company owned by Richard "Kirky-C" Salmon. Salmon said the shooting might have had roots in a fight that happened at the Thunderbird on May 9 during a show the DJs were hosting.

Salmon said Neely, 29, and Rittigan, 35, were spinning tunes for a birthday party that night, and a partier wanted to get to the microphone to sing. The DJs let him up to the mic, Salmon said, "but I guess they didn't let him sing long enough."

A fight involving the cut-off singer and the DJs ensued, Salmon said. He was told by deputies that that fight two weeks ago and the shooting at the Thunderbird last weekend may be related.

"It was an altercation over the stupidest thing," Salmon said.

Deputies today said they continued to search for the shooter and another man seen bolting from the bar and speeding away in a late-model BMW. They did not elaborate on the investigation.

Neely and Rittigan played music to dance by. They spun hip hop, reggae and even some calypso. It didn't resonate in hatred or violence and was geared to get people out of their chairs and onto the dance floor.

"They were not the type of guys to make enemies," said a Tampa business associate, Dwight "Super D" Blake. "They play for people. They were very popular, especially in Tampa."

The pair of DJs, Neely from Tampa and Rittigan from Riverview, played just about every Saturday at the Jerk Hut Island Grille on Fowler Avenue in Tampa and recently had sought to expand their audience. A couple of months ago, they began playing the Thunderbird bar in Auburndale in Polk County. They were there about twice a month, Blake said.

The ambition proved fatal.

Both men were gunned down early Saturday morning inside the bar. A third man, Kevin Jordache Webster, 29, of Deltona, a DJ and friend of the victims who was there to sell his CDs, was shot to death as well.

Blake, a promoter who is helping stage a benefit concert this weekend, said the deaths of the two DJs has left a hole in the local island-music scene.

The benefit will take place Saturday at the Jerk Hut Island Grille, 2101 E. Fowler Ave., and all the proceeds will go to the families of the three men. Neely left five children, he said.

Admission is $20, and additional donations will be accepted. The concert starts at 9 p.m.

"All three of these guys were unique," Blake said. "They were good people. It is sad, real sad."

He said Neely, who went by the stage name Tony Montana, focused on his children all the time. Blake said that on the Friday before he went to Auburndale, Neely told him that he wanted to get his children some gifts.

"For him, it all came down to his kids," Blake said.

The gig at the Thunderbird was the first time the two DJs ventured outside Tampa, Blake said.

"They wanted to branch out," he said. "It was the only way to take it to another level."

The duo had developed a following in Tampa, he said, and the move to perform outside the area was sure to draw new fans.

"It was pretty much growing all over the place," Blake said.

Rittigan same to Tampa from the Bahamas about four years ago, Blake said. He went by the stage name Chris Rock and "adapted to the Jamaican culture very well," Blake said. Rittigan had a wife and two children.

Deputies described one of the men they are looking as a black male in his mid to late 20s, 6 feet to 6-foot-2, approximately 200 to 225 pounds with a short braid hairstyle. He was wearing black dress slacks, a black, short-sleeve button-up shirt and square-toed loafer-style shoes.

The second man was said to be black, in his mid to late 20s, 5-foot-5 to 5-foot-7 and weighing 150 to 170 pounds with a short braid hairstyle. The man was wearing blue jeans and a beige jacket with a hoodie.

Reporter Keith Morelli can be reached at (813) 259-7760 or kmorelli@tampatrib.com.

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