A$AP Rocky gestures out of the window of a automobile whereas leaving courtroom after he was discovered not responsible in his trial Tuesday in Los Angeles.
Damian Dovarganes/AP
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Damian Dovarganes/AP
LOS ANGELES — A$AP Rocky dove from the protection desk into the arms of Rihanna Tuesday as a clerk learn the not responsible verdict at his trial on two felony counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm.
The Los Angeles courtroom, stuffed with followers of the hip-hop performer and his singing celebrity associate, exploded into screaming glee as Rocky and Rihanna embraced and sobbed.
After a three-week trial, the jury deliberated for simply three hours to achieve the decision that spared Rocky, whose authorized title is Rakim Mayers, a jail sentence that might have run greater than 20 years.
“Thank y’all for saving my life,” he informed the jurors as they left the Los Angeles courtroom.
Amid the chaos, it took the clerk some time to learn the second not responsible verdict, although it was most unlikely the jury would cut up on the counts.
On the eve of the trial, Rocky turned down a prosecution provide of simply six months in jail, together with probation and different situations, if he would plead responsible to 1 depend.
Insisting on his innocence, 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 cheap doubt of his guilt.
Rihanna cried and hugged the protection legal professionals, as did Rocky. 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 among the closing arguments.
The decision got here on the top of Rocky’s fame, if not the top of his music profession. The three-time Grammy nominee, trend mogul and actor has a banner yr within the works, and might now look to it with out the specter of jail hanging over him. He’s scheduled to headline the Rolling Loud music pageant in March; he is likely one of the celeb co-chairs of trend’s largest evening, the Met Gala, in Might; and he stars with Denzel Washington in director Spike Lee’s movie Highest 2 Lowest, set for launch in early summer time.
Prosecutors and their witnesses mentioned that he was beefing with a former good friend, A$AP Relli, with whom he had been in a crew who known as themselves the A$AP Mob since highschool. They mentioned 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 mentioned one of many photographs grazed his knuckle however was not critically damage.
Rocky’s lawyer Joe Tacopina mentioned in his closing argument that Relli is “an indignant pathological liar” who “dedicated perjury time and again and time and again.”
Rocky’s legal professionals and witnesses they known as mentioned 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 mentioned he fired it as a warning as a result of Relli was attacking one other member of their crew.
The jurors had been informed 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 mates with him that evening had been in imminent hazard of harm, and that he used cheap power, they might 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 reality carrying a prop gun or that he acted in self-defense. They didn’t should 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 celeb or household features of the case, and prompt Rihanna bringing the children to closing arguments was an try to control the jury.
“You aren’t allowed to contemplate how this may have an effect on Rihanna and his children,” the prosecutor mentioned. “We’re all chargeable for our personal actions on the earth.”
After the decision, Tacopina mentioned outdoors the courthouse that “Rocky didn’t need her right here, I’ll let you know that.”
He mentioned Rocky “wished to protect her from this. Wild horses could not hold her away.”
“I can not think about this has been something however a life-altering expertise for them,” he mentioned.
