Fyre Festival Where Are They Now: Billy McFarland, Ja Rule, Andy King and More

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Fyre Festival Where Are They Now: Billy McFarland, Ja Rule, Andy King and More

The 2017 Fyre Festival became a punchline after defrauding its attendees and just generally being a complete disaster. The idea for the music festival in the Bahamas came to entrepreneur Billy McFarland, who wanted to promote his Fyre app, which helped users book music talent. McFarland partnered with Ja Rule to create the event. The duo decided to get the word out via social media by paying celebrities and influencers — including Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Hailey Bieber (née Baldwin) and Emily Ratajkowski — to promote the concert. However, during the April 2017 weekend, concertgoers did not get the luxurious experience they were promised on the island of Great Exuma. Instead, the extraordinarily poorly planned event had nonstop problems related to security, food availability, accommodations, medical services and artist relations. It was so bad that the event had to be canceled, and many attendees were literally left stranded on the remote part of the island. Both McFarland and Ja Rule were sued for $100 million in a class-action lawsuit brought by attendees in May 2017. The following month, McFarland was arrested by federal agents and charged with wire fraud. Keep scrolling to see where the people behind Fyre Fest are now:

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Billy McFarland

McFarland was sued by concertgoers and arrested by federal agents following the event but was released on $300,000 bail. In March 2018, McFarland pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud to defraud investors and ticket holders, and a second count to defraud a ticket vendor. He also forfeited $26 million after he admitted to using fake documents to attract investors. Six months later he was also charged with selling fraudulent tickets to the Met Gala, Burning Man, and Coachella while he was out on bail.

In October 2018, McFarland was sentenced to six years in prison. However, he was released early in March 2022 and finished his sentence under house arrest in September 2022. 

Six years after the Fyre Festival disaster, McFarland announced that he was organizing a follow-up festival and that tickets were available to purchase.

"Fyre Festival II tickets are officially on sale," McFarland announced in an August 2023 video. "It has been the absolute wildest journey to get here, and it really all started during a seventh-month stint in solitary confinement. I wrote out this 50-page plan of how it would take this overall interest and demand in Fyre and how it would take my ability [to] bring people from around the world together to make the impossible happen."  

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Ja Rule

Ja Rule didn’t face any jail time for his involvement with the music festival. In January 2019, the rapper explained that he was duped by his business partner. “I too was hustled, scammed, bamboozled, hood winked, lead astray!!!” he tweeted at the time.

In November 2019, a judge cleared Ja Rule of any wrongdoing. The following month, Ja  dropped a new song titled “Fyre” that referenced the event and the aftermath. 

“The fest—the festival is on fire / We don’t need no water, make that motherf—r hotter,” he raps. “Hotter than the sun, but it wasn’t that / Show of hands if you got your money back? / Just playing, I got sued for that / 100 mil to be exact.” 

Currently, Ja Rule runs an app called ICONN which is very similar in concept to McFarland’s Fyre app. 

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Andy King

King was an event planner that assisted with the logistical details for the festival and had previously worked with McFarland on other business ventures. Following Fyre Fest, King continued to serve as a cofounder and event producer for his company Inward Point. 

He also made a memorable appearance in the Netflix documentary Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened. In the doc, King provided the most meme-able moment when he revealed he was willing to provide oral sex to Bahamian customs officers to bring in bottles of water Fyre had previously ordered. Instead, King paid an import fee to get the water released. 

In August 2023, King confirmed to Yahoo Entertainment that he would be working with McFarland on Fyre Festival II. 

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Maryann Rolle

Rolle owned the Exuma Point Bar & Grill. In the Netflix docuseries, she revealed she was scammed out of $50,000, which she said was her life savings, that she was owed for feeding the festival crew and guests. She and a friend put together a GoFundMe campaign that ended up raising $241,548. However, according to Vice, Rolle was almost scammed again after her pal attempted to walk away with half the money raised.