Tory Lanez is denied a new trial in Megan Thee Stallion shooting
A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge Tuesday denied a motion for a new trial for rapper Tory Lanez, who was convicted of three felonies in December for shooting hip-hop star Megan Thee Stallion in the feet and wounding her.
Judge David Herriford rejected arguments by lawyers for Lanez, whose legal name is Daystar Peterson, that evidence was wrongly admitted at the trial he presided over. He said the exclusion of the disputed evidence would not have made a difference at the trial.
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Peterson, 30, will now be sentenced for convictions of assault with a semiautomatic firearm, having a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle and discharging a firearm with gross negligence. He could get up to 22 years in prison and faces deportation to his native Canada.
No sentencing date has been set.
As he was led from the courtroom back to jail after a hearing on the motion Monday, Peterson pleaded with Herriford to help him, saying: “I could be your son. I could be your brother.”
Motions for a new trial filed immediately afterward with the same judge are a common precursor to appealing to a higher court, something Peterson’s attorneys plan to do. The motions are very rarely successful.
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Peterson’s lawyers asserted that a post from his Instagram account was improperly admitted into evidence. They said testimony by Megan Thee Stallion, whose real name is Megan Pete, that Peterson urged her not to go to police because he was on parole and would be in serious trouble was both untrue and an improper allowance of prior bad acts. And they said DNA evidence that prosecutors used to argue Peterson was the likely shooter fell well short of industry standards.
Peterson’s attorneys were disappointed from the start of Monday’s all-day oral arguments on their motion.
They had an elaborate presentation prepared, complete with audiovisuals and witnesses, but Herriford would have none of it, insisting instead on narrow legal arguments on the precise issues raised, the norm for such motions in California court.
They pleaded at length with Herriford to allow them to present their arguments in the way they had planned.
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“I feel that I would be ineffective if we proceeded,” defense attorney Jose Baez said. “Mr. Peterson has the right to due process for which he is entitled.”
They moved on under protest, and later filed a motion to have the judge disqualified.
Peterson’s lawyers, who did not represent him at trial, said the attorney who did, George Mgdesyan, made mistakes in his case because he was given so little time to prepare before trial when the rapper’s previous attorney dropped out.
Pete testified that Peterson 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.
Mgdesyan said at trial that Megan was lying and that Peterson had not pulled the trigger. He said afterward that there was not sufficient evidence to convict.
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