Jury deliberates in trial of shooting of Megan
Jurors began deliberations Thursday at the trial of rapper Tory Lanez, who is charged with shooting and wounding hip-hop star Megan Thee Stallion in the feet.
The jury of seven women and five men deliberated for just over three hours after hearing the last part of the defense’s closing argument that began a day earlier and a brief rebuttal from Los Angeles County prosecutors.
They did not reach a verdict and will return today to resume talks on the three felony counts brought against the 30-year-old Canadian rapper, who has pleaded not guilty: discharging a firearm with gross negligence, assault with a semiautomatic firearm and carrying a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle. The counts could lead to up to 22 years in prison and deportation.
Megan Thee Stallion, 27, whose legal name is Megan Pete, testified that Lanez fired a handgun at the back of her feet and shouted for her to dance as she walked away from an SUV in which they had been riding in the Hollywood Hills in the summer of 2020. She needed surgery to remove bullet fragments from her feet.
In closing arguments, prosecutors emphasized the courage it took for her to come forward and the vitriol she has faced for it. They said she had no incentive to tell anything but the truth.
Lanez’s lawyer alleged in his closing that the shots were fired by Megan’s thenbest-friend Kelsey Harris in a jealous fight over Lanez, who tried to stop the shooting. The attorney, George Mgdesyan, alleges Megan created a more sympathetic narrative by pinning the shooting on Lanez.
Harris denied being the shooter and identified Lanez as the one holding the gun. Her attorney, in an email, declined to comment on her involvement.
Lanez — whose legal name is Daystar Peterson — began releasing mixtapes in 2009 and saw a steady rise in popularity, moving on to major-label albums. His last two reached the top 10 on Billboard’s charts.
Megan Thee Stallion was already a major rising star at the time of the shooting, and her prominence has surged since. She won a Grammy for best new artist in 2021, and had No. 1 singles on the Billboard Hot 100.
Man who was focus of ‘Serial’ gets new job
Adnan Syed, who was released from a Maryland prison this year after his case was the focus of the podcast “Serial,” has been hired by Georgetown University as a program associate for the university’s Prisons and Justice Initiative, the university said.
Syed started working this month for the initiative, which advocates for others in the criminal legal system, the university tweeted Wednesday.
In his new role, Syed will support Georgetown’s “Making an Exoneree” class, in which students reinvestigate decades-old wrongful convictions, create short documentaries about the cases and work to help bring innocent people home from prison, the university wrote in an online announcement.
“PJI’s team and programming has so much to gain from Adnan’s experience, insight, and commitment to serving incarcerated people and returning citizens,” the organization tweeted.
Syed had been one of 25 incarcerated students at Georgetown’s inaugural bachelor of liberal arts program at the Patuxent Institute in Jessup, Md., during the year leading up to his release, the university said.
“To go from prison to being a Georgetown student and then to actually be on campus on a pathway to work for Georgetown at the Prisons and Justice Initiative, it’s a full circle moment,” Syed said in the university’s announcement.
Syed, 41, hopes to continue his Georgetown education and eventually go to law school.
After spending 23 years in prison, he walked out of a Baltimore courthouse in September after a judge overturned his conviction for the 1999 murder of high school student Hae Min Lee, Syed’s ex-girlfriend.
Prosecutors said a reinvestigation of the case revealed evidence regarding the possible involvement of two alternate suspects. The two suspects may have been involved individually or together, the state’s attorney’s office said.
The suspects were known persons at the time of the original investigation and were not properly ruled out nor disclosed to the defense, prosecutors said.
Baltimore State’s Attorney office cited new results from DNA testing that was conducted using a more modern technique than when evidence in the case was first tested. The recent testing excluded Syed as a suspect, prosecutors said.
Syed always maintained his innocence. His case captured attention in 2014 when “Serial” focused on Lee’s killing and raised doubts about evidence used byprosecutors. The program shattered podcast-streaming and downloading records.