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Portuguese rapper 18 Karat was deported by plane from Germany to Portugal, his country of origin, in the early hours of Wednesday morning, and his family has already been informed of his whereabouts.
“He managed to get in touch with his family this morning [Wednesday] and tell them the time and place of his arrival,” said the musician’s lawyer, Lisa Grüter, quoted by German daily Die Zeit (source in Portuguese). The deportation was confirmed to German news agency dpa by the authorities in the city of Dortmund, where the 40-year-old rapper moved with his family as a youngster.
The artist was removed from Germany without his mobile phone and was only allowed to contact his relatives after landing in Portugal.
Euronews contacted the Public Security Police (PSP) on Wednesday, which is responsible for border control at Portuguese airports, as well as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MNE), to confirm details of the operation and of 18 Karat’s legal and social status, but received no answers to the questions submitted.
Ivo Vieira Silva, the artist’s real name, has since 2022 been serving a sentence of six years and three months’ imprisonment for several serious drug-trafficking offences. Dortmund had already announced in August 2025 that it intended to file a deportation request, and the German courts ultimately ordered his direct expulsion.
The rapper had served around four years of his sentence, taking into account the time spent in custody on remand since his arrest in June 2022. After a planned period of release from prison was cancelled, the Portuguese national was moved to another wing of the jail, a sign that deportation was about to go ahead.
According to his lawyer, the musician was being held under a semi-open regime and was close to completing vocational training as a painter and varnisher. Within a few weeks, the German judiciary was due to formally assess whether to suspend the remainder of his sentence and grant conditional release on bail.
“In my view, that decision should have been given priority,” the lawyer said, quoted by Die Zeit, describing the immediate deportation as “a disgrace to the rule of law”. Being expelled from Germany also means a much longer re-entry ban.
In Portugal, the artist will remain at liberty, but deportation does not wipe out his sentence. If he returns to German soil, he will be arrested immediately to serve the remaining prison time (two years).
“Compelling reasons of public policy”
Ivo Vieira Silva lodged an appeal against the deportation ordered by the Dortmund authorities, who also stripped him of his right to free movement within the European Union.
In court, he argued that he remained in contact with his family and his young daughter, Amalia, adding that he has a German partner and that the couple are expecting a second child in the near future.
The rapper maintained that this context, combined with the fact that he was in prison, showed that he would not reoffend and therefore did not pose any threat.
However, the Administrative Court in Gelsenkirchen was not convinced and rejected the appeal. The judges cited “compelling reasons of public policy”, noting that drug trafficking has serious consequences for society. During a police operation targeting the Portuguese rapper, officers seized almost twelve kilos of cannabis, small quantities of ecstasy and hashish, and two small-scale cannabis grows.
The court also pointed to a concrete risk of reoffending, with the judges arguing that the rapper had not demonstrated that he had cut ties with the network through which he committed the crimes.
The first-instance ruling was upheld on Tuesday, in an emergency hearing, by the Higher Administrative Court of North Rhine-Westphalia.
Leading figure on the German rap scene
Ivo Vieira Silva broke through on the German rap scene in 2015 with his debut album “FSK 18 Brutal”. Several of his tracks have racked up between 10 and 30 million streams on Spotify.
Known for wearing a golden mask, the rapper managed to keep his identity secret for a decade, despite becoming hugely prominent thanks to his collaboration with the label Banger Musik.
In 2025, he decided to reveal his name and nationality. Originally from Portugal, the country that issued his passport, he very likely has Bosnian roots, according to German website Raptastisch (source in Portuguese), which covers celebrity news from the rap world.
Last year was also when he became a father for the first time while serving his sentence. He was given permission to leave prison, where he had married his German partner, Maya, to attend the birth of their daughter, Amalia Adriana. The couple’s second child, conceived during another period of temporary release from prison, is due in September 2026.
18 Karat’s wife had already said that the couple intended to move to Portugal after the artist’s release, stressing that her husband “can make music anywhere in the world”.
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