Names and faces
Atlanta-based rapper 21 Savage said in an interview aired Friday that he didn’t talk about his British citizenship before because he didn’t want to get deported.
The Grammy-nominated artist, whose given name is She’yaa Bin Abraham-Joseph, was arrested Feb. 3. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement called it a targeted operation. He was released from immigration custody Wednesday on a $100,000 bond. Abraham-Joseph, now 26, told ABC’s Good Morning America he had no idea what a visa was when his mother brought him to the U.S. at 7 years old. His visa expired in 2006. “I knew I wasn’t born here,” he said. “But I didn’t know like, what that meant as far as when I transitioned into an adult, how it was going to affect my life.” The rapper said he wasn’t hiding the fact that he isn’t a U.S. citizen, but “I didn’t want to get deported so I’m not going to just come out and say, ‘Hey by the way, I wasn’t born here.’” His lawyers have said he applied for a new visa in 2017, and his case remains pending. One of his lawyers, Charles Kuck, said earlier this week that if the case follows the normal trajectory, it could take two to three years. ICE spokesman Bryan Cox said shortly after Abraham-Joseph was taken into custody that he was arrested in a targeted operation that had been planned weeks to months in advance. Cox said at the time that Abraham-Joseph had overstayed his visa and also was convicted on felony drug charges in Fulton County, Ga., in October 2014. Abraham-Joseph’s lawyers have disputed that he has a felony conviction on his record. “He has a singular offense for marijuana when he was a college-age person,” attorney Alex Spiro said in the television interview. “That’s vacated, sealed. There’s no issue.”
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air star Alfonso Ribeiro has been denied a copyright for the “Carlton” dance, which he’s suing two video game makers over. The denial from the U.S. Copyright Office was revealed Wednesday in a motion to dismiss Ribeiro’s lawsuit against Take-Two Interactive, the makers of NBA 2K16, which Ribeiro says illegally makes use of the dance. The document denying the copyright says the moves in the “Carlton” represent a simple dance routine rather than a work of choreography, which can be copyrighted. A hearing on the motion to dismiss is scheduled for March 18. Ribeiro’s dance was popularized through his character, Carlton Banks, on the 1990s sitcom. He’s also suing Epic Games over the use of the dance in Fortnite, joining several rappers suing the game over dances. 21 Savage