Toronto rapper Tory Lanez is now five days away from his August 7 sentencing in the Los Angeles County Superior Court for his guilty verdict in the highly-publicized 2020 Megan Thee Stallion shooting case. And on Wednesday (August 2), Lanez’s team issued a memo to the court recommending probation for Lanez instead of prison time, citing his need for substance abuse rehabilitation.
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According to Legal Affairs and Trials reporter Meghann Cuniff, who has followed the case closely since the initial trial, Lanez’s attorneys are asking “that he be released from jail to probation and a substance abuse program.” If this request is granted, it would be a huge shift in the expected penalty for Lanez, who was hit with multiple charges in December for assault with a semiautomatic firearm, having an unregistered loaded gun in a vehicle, and discharge with gross negligence.
Lanez, who currently sits in jail awaiting next week’s sentencing, is likely looking at a minimum of nine years behind bars, as his appeals for re-trials have been denied. When speaking on the matter in early May, Los Angeles district attorney Alexander Bott, who served as a prosecutor in the case, explained why he predicts Lanez could be in prison for nearly a decade.
“The sentencing range on this case is roughly nine years all the way up to 22 years and eight months,” he said. “The minimum would be approximately nine years. The judge could, theoretically, stave certain allegations and get below that, but that would be pretty unlikely… My job as a deputy district attorney is to enforce the laws that are written by the legislature… I would say any time you point a gun at someone and pull the trigger five times, that’s an action that could easily kill a person, and I think that’s an action that deserves serious consequences.”
[RELATED: Meek Mill Shows Support for Tory Lanez Amid Megan Thee Stallion Shooting]
A month after Bott’s forecast, the case’s prosecutors actually recommended to L.A. County Superior Court Judge David Herriford that Lanez serve 13 years in prison. Their memorandum stated that Lanez’s actions on social media following the incident proved his indifference to Megan Thee Stallion’s safety.
“Words have power and the pen is oftentimes mightier than the sword,” the memorandum read. “In this case, (Lanez) used both. Not content to have hurt the victim by use of his sword (gun), he also used his pen. His online posts for nearly three years have re-traumatized the victim.”
The Los Angeles County Superior Court has yet to respond to Wednesday’s memo.
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