A $ Ap Rock Prise Arguments trial when Rihanna brings children to court

A $ AP RockyThe assault trial of firearms entered the closing arguments on Thursday, with prosecutors launching the rapper nominated for Grammy as the antagonist of a street fight that allegedly ended in real shots in a corner of Hollywood street three years ago. Meanwhile, the rapper’s defense said prosecutors could not prove his case, painting the alleged victim A $ AP FILLI As an “angry pathological liar” who “manufactured evidence” to demand money.

Going the jury members first, the deputy prosecutor of the District Paul Przelomiec sought to fly for Rocky’s statement that he only carried a support gun when he met Filli, Terell Ephron was born, near a parking lot outside the W Hollywood hotel the 6 November 2021, amid a breakdown. Your 15 -year friendship. But just a few minutes from his sum, all the eyes turned to the gallery door as Rocky’s partner Rihanna He entered the courtroom with the two young children of the couple, Rza and Riot. The superstar singer took a seat in the first row with her youngest son in her lap. Rocky, born Rakim Mayers, sat at the defense table, listening silently while Przelomiec continued his presentation.

“This is not a difficult case. … There is only an important question in this case, a critical question that must answer, “said Przelomiec.” That is: Mr. Mayers, the man at the table, used a real gun or used a false gun? “

In comments that range from sarcastic to indignant, Przelomiec made fun of Mayers’ statement that he carried a support gun, calling it “absurd” and “insulting to her intelligence.” He argued that the weapon was real and claimed the surveillance clips of two locations. He argued that when the weapon was shielded for the first time in a parking lot in front of the hotel, Mayers’ friend to $ Ap Illz seemed to go back quickly. He said that when the weapon appeared for the second time one block away, filling, born Terell Ephron, divered behind Illz, born Illijah Ulanger, to use it as a “human shield.”

“No one in that video is acting as if it were a false gun. Everyone is reacting to a real gun, ”he said. “If you are holding a support gun, and Mr. Ephron knows that it is a support gun, why does he have to run towards Mr. Ephron? Why do you have to move at all? Why do you have to fly (and) bend down and dodge, side by side, to try to get a line of vision around Illz?

When it was his turn, main defense lawyer Joseph Tacopina said that “common sense” showed that the firearm was known as a support gun. Why more Ephron would continue to chase Mayers from the garage to second place, reprimanding him aloud and “almost begging him to shoot,” he rhetorically asked. He also asked why Mayers would shoot real bullets with Ephron grabbing Ulanger. “According to them, a gun shot, a real weapon, his friend Illz. That makes no sense, ”Tacopina said. “There is no form.”

The high -power defense lawyer argued that Ephron was repeatedly perjurized on the stand. “It was like a perjuría miniseries,” he made fun, focusing much of his attention on what was one of the most dramatic turns of trial. With the help of the video, he brought the jury members to his interrogation of Ephron, where he asked if Ephron had triggered a 9 mm semi -automatic before the incident. After Ephron said no, Tacopina asked if maybe he did it in a shooting field. “You listened to me, no definitely,” Ephron replied. Tacopina reminded the jury who later faced Ephron with a video that showed Ephron in a shooting field on October 19, 2021, two weeks before the incident. Ephron responded by testifying that the video was probably a range of weapons in New Jersey, definitely not in Los Angeles. Three days later, Ephron returned to the witness post and said he did a “task” during the weekend and determined that the range was actually the Los Angeles Arms Club. Tacopina argued on Thursday that Ephron was forced to enter the face because a Twitter user Posted an interior photo of the Los Angeles Arms Club that seemed “identical” to Ephron’s video.

“Remember how everything developed here when considering its credibility,” Tacopina said. “There would be no reason to lie about that unless I had to cover up something.”

Tacopina argued that Ephron had access to 9 mm guts in Los Angeles two weeks before the incident and tried to pass two of them as spent cartridges of the alleged shooting. He questioned how seven LAPD officers could spend 20 minutes looking at the scene with their powerful flashlights and finding “nothing”, but then Ephron returned with his girlfriend shortly before midnight and found two housings in a matter of minutes using only the light in his phone.

“If the word of any witness deserved to be tested in this case, it is Terell Ephron. (He is) a man whose language is a stranger to the truth, ”Tacopina said. The lawyer also questioned why prosecutors never used GPS data to confirm that Ephron returned to the scene and never called Ephron’s girlfriend to the stand. “If Mr. Ephron’s girlfriend could corroborate her claim, don’t you think you would have heard her?” asked.

Tacopina also urged jury members to remember that the housings were tested for digital footprints, but none was found. He said that a police witness testified that “rain, water, cars and even wind” could interfere with the collection of an impression. “Imagine that, maybe the wind cleaned the fingerprints,” he said with exasperation. “Are you joking, wind? Did the wind hit a digital footprint of a shell housing? That is an excuse, not a fact. ”

The final arguments followed a 11 -day trial distributed in four weeks in which prosecutors presented a long testimony of Ephron along with a woman who observed the incident of a balcony of the seventh floor and four investigators of the Los Angeles Police Department. Mayers refused to testify in his own defense. His star witness was a $ AP Twelvyy, Jamel Phillips, born, a fellow rapper of Harlem and member of the Mafia of $ AP who was also with him that night. Phillips told the jury that he and Ephron knew that the weapon was an accessory. He said that when the support weapon appeared, Ephron made fun of Mayers: “Shoot that false gun.”

Mayers, 36, is struggling against two serious assault crimes with a semi -automatic firearm. It faces up to 24 years in prison if it is declared guilty, although it would probably receive much less. The rapper “Sundress” affirms that the weapon was an accessory obtained from the video “dmb” that filmed with Rihanna in the Bronx in July 2021. His defense states that Ephron was the aggressor that night, he knew that the weapon was false and then invented Evidence to shake depressed for money.

Prosecutors claim that Mayers fired two 9 mm bullets in Ephron during the heyday of their argument at the corner of Selma Avenue and Vista del Mar Avenue. During his direct testimony, Ephron said a bullet touched his left hand, leaving visible injuries under his knuckles.

In its closing on Thursday, Przelomiec said that although no one was seriously injured, the case was still serious considering that someone else could have been beaten in that “occupied area of ​​Hollywood” on a Saturday night. He admitted that the video of the first confrontation at the entrance of a parking lot did not capture the moment that Mayers allegedly pointed to Ephron, but said that did not matter. The video showed the alleged weapon in Mayers, and that was enough, he argued.

“At the time the defendant took that gun, he armed himself and was able to inflict injuries to Mr. Ephron, that crime was completed at that time,” he said. “The weapon does not have to point directly to Mr. Ephron. … He doesn’t even need to be fired. “

During his two days testifying as a defense star witness, Phillips told the jury that All supposedly knew that Mayers wore a false gunalleging that he took him as a deterrent element because he was a victim of previous violence and stalker. Under oath, Phillips testified that Ephron was the initial aggressor when they found the incident night. He said Mayers tried to get away, but Ephron pursued them to a corner, mocking Mayers. Phillips also said that Ephron physically attacked Ulanger once they reached the corner of Selma Ave. and Vista del Mar Ave., which led Mayers to shoot two blank spaces as warning shots to scare him.

For his part, Ephron testified that Mayers grabbed him first during his initial fight outside the hotel and threatened to kill him. He said he only put his hands on Ulanger to prevent him from shooting him. He described feeling as if he were “in a movie” during the incident. He admitted having filed a demand of $ 30 million, but said it was fair considering his life. It has been a “living hell” since then. He said he has been labeled as “Soplón” and lost his music management company because there are no artists who want to work with him.

Both parties have affirmed that the blurred surveillance video of the alleged shooting supports their interpretation of events. He was recorded without sound, but prosecutors synchronized him with the sound of two pop -ups engraved from a different camera at the return of the corner. Mayers lawyers used the same methodology to create their own synchronization. In the version of the Prosecutor’s Office, the first pop occurs just before Ephron is entangled with Ulanger. In the defense version, the first pop occurs after Ephron is seen in contact with Ulanger, which supports the Mayers defense statement shot to defend Ulanger. The judge allowed us to admit both videos, leaving the jury with the task of determining what made more sense.

On Tuesday, Judge Mark S. Arnold told the jury for the first time that They could consider a secondary base To acquit Mayers if they simply do not accept that he will carry a support gun. The judge said that if the jury members determine that the elders “reasonably believed” that he or one of his friends were in “imminent danger” of suffering body injuries, and that a reasonable amount of force to defend himself was necessary to defend Of that danger, Mayers could not find is not guilty on the basis of self -defense.

After the jury members appeared for the morning’s break, Mayers approached and picked up one if the couple’s children and sat with Rihanna at the bank. The young children did not return to the afternoon session. Closing arguments are scheduled to resume Friday.