(Los Angeles) The American rapper A $ AP Rocky had only a false pistol when he threatened a former friend, who accused him of having shot him in 2021, his defense assured on Friday.
Posted at 3:57 p.m.
Updated at 10:42 p.m.
Born Rakim Mayers, the 36-year-old artist, who has two children with singer Rihanna, is tried in a court of Los Angeles for assault with a semi-automatic weapon on Terell Ephron, one of his former friends with whom he had founded The Hip-Hop collective having inspired its stage name.
Terell Ephron, alias A $ AP Relli, accuses the star of having shot several times in a night altercation in the streets of Hollywood in November 2021, injuring him slightly by hand.
The two former friends had scrambled because some members of the collective estimated that A $ AP Rocky had become arrogant and ungrateful since its ascent towards celebrity.
Mr. Ephron’s resentment “is the catalyst for this incident,” said the lawyer for A $ AP Rocky, Joe Topina.
“It was Relli who was looking for a fight,” he added, believing that video surveillance images show him establishing the first physical contact.
The lawyer also assured that the weapon with which A $ AP Rocky would have threatened his ex-congeal was a simple film accessory, used in “musical clips” or to shoot white at the start of a race.
“The evidence will clearly show that the object [n’était] absolutely nothing but a white pistol […]a false pistol, “he insisted, ensuring that his client is the victim of an attempted extortion.
-According to the lawyer, seven police officers searched the altercation scene a few hours later, without finding either sockets or weapons.
But Mr. Ephron returned to the scene after their departure, and says he discovered a pair of 9 mm caliber sockets. Evidence he himself made, according to the lawyer.
“It is only […] of a clearly intentional extortion attempt on the part of Relli [pour financer un] Extravagant lifestyle, ”hammered the lawyer.
The trial is scheduled to continue on Tuesday.
At $ AP Rocky, who appears free, refused a plea-guilty agreement with the accusation that would have made him spend six months behind bars.
After two albums – Long. Live. A$AP et At. Long. Last. A$AP – Who catapulted him to the rank of the show during the first half of the decade 2010, the rapper has produced little music in recent years.
In 2019, he was sentenced to suspended prison in Sweden after a fight. A case that had caused diplomatic tensions between Stockholm and Washington, pushing ex-president Donald Trump to intervene.
