The rapper Mystikal, who sang songs like “Shake Ya Ass,” has been accused of rape more than a year after charges against the musician were dropped, which had kept him in jail for 18 months.
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Mystikal has now been jailed again due to the accusations and faces a stiff penalty.
The rapper, whose real name is Michael Tyler, was arrested on charges of rape and domestic abuse battery, said Sheriff Bobby Webre of Louisiana’s Ascension Parish, which is located just outside Baton Rouge.
The 51-year-old rapper, who has amassed hundreds of millions of streams, is being held without bond on 10 charges, said the sheriff’s office.
Attorney Joel Pearce, of Shreveport, who has previously represented the rapper, said he believes bond will be set at a hearing on Tuesday. He added, “I’m expecting it to be a big bond.”
Pearce has yet to be hired by Mystikal for the current case but he and the rapper are slated to meet later this week to discuss options. He previously represented Mystikal on charges in 2017, which accused him of sexual assault at a Shreveport casino in 2016. Prosecutors later dropped those charges, for rape and kidnapping, in December of 2020 after new evidence was presented.
Shreveport, Louisiana is more than 200 miles northwest of Ascension Parish, Louisiana.
Mystikal pleaded guilty in 2002 to sexual battery. He served six years in prison.
In a statement, Webre said local deputies were called to a hospital around midnight on Sunday (July 30) about a sexual assault. They interviewed the victim. “Through further investigation, Michael ‘Mystikal’ Tyler was identified as a suspect,” the statement added.
According to the Associated Press, “The new charges include first-degree rape, simple robbery, false imprisonment, simple criminal damage to property, and drug charges, including possession of amphetamines. A conviction for first-degree rape carries at least a life sentence—the prosecutor can choose whether to ask for the death penalty.”
This is a developing story.
(Photo by Stephen J. Cohen/Getty Images)
