Rapper A$AP Rocky was discovered not responsible Tuesday of firing a handgun at a former buddy on a Hollywood road in 2021.
“Thank y’all for saving my life,” he advised jurors as they left the Los Angeles courtroom. They cleared him of two felony counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm.
The 36-year-old hip-hop star, vogue mogul and burgeoning actor — whose authorized title is Rakim Mayers — risked greater than 24 years in jail if he had been convicted.
On the eve of trial, he turned down a prosecution provide of simply six months in jail, together with probation and different circumstances, if he would plead responsible to at least one depend.
Insisting on his innocence, and with two younger toddler sons at house alongside together with his longtime accomplice Rihanna, the 36-year-old Rocky determined to gamble {that a} jury would really feel the identical. It paid off. The jurors felt at the very least that there was affordable doubt of his guilt.
When the decision was learn, Rihanna cried and hugged the protection legal professionals. She attended the trial sporadically and introduced the couple’s two sons — 2-year-old RZA Athelston Mayers and 1-year-old Riot Rose Mayers — for a few of the closing arguments.
The decision got here on the top of Rocky’s fame, if not the head of his music profession. The three-time Grammy nominee has a banner yr within the works, and may now look to it with out the specter of jail hanging over him. He’s scheduled to headline the Rolling Loud music competition in March; he is likely one of the movie star co-chairs of vogue’s largest evening, the Met Gala, in Could; and he stars with Denzel Washington in director Spike Lee’s movie “Highest 2 Lowest,” set for launch in early summer season.
Prosecutors and their witnesses stated that he was beefing with a former buddy, A$AP Relli, with whom he had been in a crew who referred to as themselves the A$AP Mob since highschool. They stated the 2 males met up in Hollywood on Nov. 6, 2021, and after a scuffle Rocky pulled the gun and fired twice at Relli, who stated one of many photographs grazed his knuckle however was not severely damage.
Rocky’s lawyer Joe Tacopina stated in his closing argument that Relli is “an indignant pathological liar” who “dedicated perjury repeatedly and repeatedly.”
Rocky’s legal professionals and witnesses they referred to as stated Rocky had shot a prop gun that solely fires blanks, which he had been carrying for safety since taking it from a music video set months earlier. They stated he fired it as a warning as a result of Relli was attacking one other member of their crew.
The jurors had been advised that regardless of three years passing for the reason that incident, nobody talked about the phony gun to authorities till the day jury choice started on the trial.
They had been additionally instructed that in the event that they discovered that Rocky moderately believed that he or one of many two buddies with him that evening had been in imminent hazard of harm, and that he used affordable power, they may discover the defendant not responsible.
It wasn’t instantly clear whether or not they reached the decision as a result of they believed he was in actual fact carrying a prop gun or that he acted in self-defense. They didn’t need to agree on their reasoning, or clarify it outdoors of the jury room. They simply needed to attain the identical conclusion.
Rocky opted to not testify in his personal protection.
In his closing argument, Deputy District Lawyer John Lewin urged the jurors to not be influenced by the movie star or household features of the case, and urged Rihanna bringing the children to closing arguments was an try to govern the jury.
“You aren’t allowed to think about how this would possibly have an effect on Rihanna and his children,” the prosecutor stated. “We’re all answerable for our personal actions on the planet.”
