LOS ANGELES – A jury of five men and seven women was seated Thursday for the trial of rapper A$AP Rocky, who is charged with firing a gun at a former friend in 2021.
Opening statements at the Los Angeles trial of the 36-year-old hip-hop superstar and fashion maven will begin Friday after the 12 jurors and four alternates are sworn in.
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Rocky turned down a prosecution plea offer of 180 days in jail to risk years in prison if the jurors find him guilty of two felony counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm. He has pleaded not guilty and his lawyer says he committed no crime.
He opted instead to risk trial on two counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm, charges that with conviction bring a penalty of up to 24 years in prison.
It took the two sides 2 1/2 days to pick the jurors from a pool of more than a hundred candidates who packed into a downtown LA courtroom. Those chosen include a woman who is a podcast editor and actor, and a man who has worked for more than 20 years at Trader Joe's. The last alternate seated is a retired judge.
Many were excused for cause, others sent away by one of the two sides. Each had 10 jurors they could excuse without a reason. The defense used seven of their challenges, the prosecution just two.
One man questioned Thursday works as a civilian with the Los Angeles Police Department and has extensive ties to law enforcement including a cousin who was on the case's witness list but is not expected to be called.
After the judge declined to dismiss him for cause, Rocky's lawyer Joe Tacopina took him off the jury.
“Here’s a shocker, we’re going to thank and excuse juror number 27.”
Attitudes toward police were a common topic during jury selection. In several heated moments, Superior Court Judge Mark Arnold, a former sheriff's deputy, questioned those who said they mistrusted police, nearly debating with some of them.
He asked one woman, a speech pathologist, whether he should mistrust all speech pathologists based on his bad experience with one.
When another woman brought up police corruption, Arnold demanded she “tell me about the documented corruption at LAPD that you must’ve either read about or heard.”
When she brought up the Rodney King case, he asked, “You are going to hold against current police something that happened before they were born?”
Many questions were about the fame of both Rocky and especially Rihanna, his longtime life partner and the mother of his two toddler children. She was not in court Thursday, and it's not certain whether she will show up during the trial.
“What if Rihanna comes here to court, is it going to be hard for you to look over there, and see the defendant’s family, and deliver a guilty verdict?” Deputy District Attorney John Lewin asked one woman.
After a long pause, she said “yes.”
Rocky is accused of firing three or four shots at Terell Ephron, a friend from his teenage years, on the streets of Hollywood in 2021. Ephron said the shots grazed his knuckles. Rocky has pleaded not guilty, and his lawyers say he wasn't even holding a real gun, but a starter pistol he used as a prop.