$hinee $ilva

$hinee $ilva (originally Benjamin Mercedes; born 14th of "Octomay", 1986) is a struggle rapper from downtown Bridgeport. She is non-binary and prefers female pronouns.

She is known for her songs about drugs, money and prostitutes, based on her experience as a pimp. The lyrics of her #1 hit single ''I Killed That Bitch Ass Cop, Hoe! was controversially used as evidence against her in Bridgeport v. Mercedes, ''a criminal case in which she was accused of murdering with an axe, a police officer who pulled her over for a DUI stop, during which she allegedly solicited prostitution. She was acquitted due to a lack of physical evidence.

She met Ricky Blitzz, her advisor in "the not-thug life", in 2016 after she moved away from Bridgeport to get out of the spotlight.

After discovering the lack of attractive people in Sunset Valley, she married herself.

She holds a degree in basic thugonomics.

Legal Issues
In 2002, she sued the City of Bridgeport for refusing her request to change her name to $hinee $ilva, claiming that they did so to discriminate against her. After she lost, she moved to Twinbrook to take advantage of their lax laws.

In 2003, she was sued by a activist group claiming that she was discriminating against African-Americans through cultural appropriation. The case was thrown out because the court declared it to be a frivolous lawsuit.

In 2004, her father drove a car into the audience of one of her concerts and in court, he defended himself by saying he was blind.

In 2006, she was arrested on prostitution charges after she was caught placing posters advertising her services in a payphone booth. She was let out on $2,000 bail and was later acquitted due to the ambiguous wording on the posters. The phone booth is now a pilgrimage site for Bridgeport rap fans. Also in 2006, a former prostitute that she was responsible for sued her accusing her of giving her HIV. It was thrown out after it was discovered that neither the plaintiff nor the defendant had or had been diagnosed with HIV.

Income
$ilva earns most of her money from royalties from her music. In 2015, it was estimated by Growl Music Group that she earned $200,000 from her vapor-rap album Fuck Your Assthetiks alone. Her 2008 single I Killed That Bitch Ass Cop, went Platinum in Bridgeport and Twinbrook with over 800,000 copies sold and 200,000,000 streams on Spotify and YouTube.