Guilty pleasures
By NewsPress Now
Rapper Young Thug pleads guilty to gang, drug and gun charges
ATLANTA | Rapper Young Thug pleaded guilty Thursday in Atlanta to gang, drug and gun charges and will be released from jail, though he could be put back behind bars if he violates the terms of his sentence.
The 33-year-old Grammy winning artist, whose given name is Jeffery Williams, entered his pleas without reaching a deal with prosecutors after negotiations between the two sides broke down, lead prosecutor Adriane Love said. That left the sentence completely up to Fulton County Superior Court Judge Paige Reese Whitaker.
Young Thug’s plea comes two and a half years after he was arrested and charged and nearly a year after the prosecution started presenting evidence in the problem-plagued trial. Jury selection at the courthouse in Atlanta began in January 2023 and took nearly 10 months. Prosecutors have called dozens of witnesses since opening statements last November in the trial of six defendants.
The trial has faced many delays, including in July when the original judge was removed after two defendants sought his recusal, citing a meeting the judge held with prosecutors and a state witness.
Young Thug pleaded guilty to one gang charge, three drug charges and two gun charges. He also entered a no contest plea to another gang charge and a racketeering conspiracy charge, meaning that he decided not to contest those charges but can be punished for them as if he had pleaded guilty.
The judge imposed a sentence of 40 years with the first five to be served in prison but commuted to time served, followed by 15 years on probation. If he successfully completes that probation without any violations, another 20 years will be commuted to time served. But if he violates the conditions, he will have to serve those 20 years in addition to any penalty for a probation violation.
Young Thug must stay away from the metro Atlanta area for the first 10 years of his probation, except for weddings, funerals, graduations or serious illness of family members, the judge said.
But she also ordered him to return to the Atlanta area four times a year during his probation to make a live anti-gang, anti-gun violence presentation at a school or a community organization serving children. She said that can count toward the 100 hours of community service she ordered him to perform each year during probation.
He’s also not allowed to associate with gang members or with the victims or other defendants in the case, with the exception of his brother and the rapper Gunna, with whom he has contractual obligations. He also cannot promote any criminal street gang or gang activity and can’t use hand signs or terminology that promotes a street gang.
Additional conditions include submitting to random drug screens and not possessing a gun. But he is allowed to travel both nationally and internationally for work, even while on probation.
Love had outlined for the judge the evidence she would have presented to prove Young Thug’s guilt, including some of his rap lyrics. She asked the judge to sentence him to 45 years, with 25 years in prison and the remaining 20 years on probation.
The rapper’s lead attorney Brian Steel said they “vehemently disagree” with many of the statements Love made and said it was “offensive” that the state is using Young Thug’s lyrics against him.
Steel said the evidence against his client is weak and accused prosecutors of misrepresenting and hiding evidence, saying Young Thug was “falsely accused.” Steel said he told his client that he thought they were winning the trial and should go through to a jury verdict.
“But he told me, ‘I can’t wait another three months if there is any possibility I could go home because I have children that are hurting. I have things to do,’” Steel said.
Steel asked the judge to impose a sentence of 45 years with five in prison commuted to time served and 40 years on probation.
Young Thug asked the judge to let him go home, saying he wouldn’t be in a similar situation again.
“I’ve learned from my mistakes, you know. I come from nothing and I’ve made something and I didn’t take full advantage of it. I’m sorry,” he said.
The judge said she appreciated that he realized the impact that he has on people worldwide. She said rap music may involve a lot of posturing but that children emulate some of the dangerous behavior mentioned in songs. She encouraged Young Thug to use his talent and influence to encourage kids to do the right thing.
“I want you to try to be more of the solution and less of the problem,” Whitaker said.
A tremendously successful rapper, Young Thug started his own record label, Young Stoner Life or YSL. Prosecutors have said he also co-founded a violent criminal street gang and that YSL stands for Young Slime Life.
He was charged two years ago in a sprawling indictment accusing him and more than two dozen other people of conspiring to violate Georgia’s anti-racketeering law. He also was charged with gang, drug and gun crimes.
Three of his Young Thug’s co-defendants had already pleaded guilty this week after reaching deals with prosecutors. The pleas leave the fates of two other co-defendants still undecided.
Nine people charged in the indictment accepted plea deals before the trial began. Twelve others are being tried separately. Prosecutors dropped charges against one defendant after he was convicted of murder in an unrelated case.
Prosecutors say lawyers for Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs want to ‘hijack’ criminal case
NEW YORK | Federal prosecutors say lawyers for Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs are trying to “hijack” the music mogul’s criminal case from them by asking a judge to force early disclosure of evidence, including his accusers’ identities.
The prosecutors urged a judge in papers filed late Wednesday to reject the requests, saying the effort to reveal the identities of prospective witnesses, in particular, was “blatantly improper.”
They said it was inappropriate for defense lawyers to seek the disclosure of victim identities and details about other evidence that would preview the government’s case.
Defense lawyers also have asked for a gag order to stop accusers’ lawyers from commenting publicly and have claimed government leaks to the media have threatened the rapper’s chance at a fair trial.
Prosecutors said the requests were “a thinly veiled attempt to restrict the Government’s proof at this early stage of the case and to hijack the criminal proceeding so the defendant can respond to civil lawsuits. This demand should be squarely rejected, especially in light of the risk it poses to witness safety.”
Prosecutors added: “As the defendant well knows, there is zero legal authority for his attempt to co-opt this criminal proceeding to defend against civil litigation.”
Combs, 54, has remained in a federal jail in Brooklyn since his Sept. 16 arrest, awaiting a trial scheduled to start on May 5.
Part of the grounds on which a judge rejected a bail package suggested by his lawyers was that he was a danger to obstruct justice and engage in witness tampering.
He has pleaded not guilty to charges that he coerced and abused women for years, aided by associates and employees.
Prosecutors said that since at least 2008, Combs engaged in a racketeering conspiracy, using his power and prestige in the entertainment industry to force women to engage in extended sex acts with male commercial sex workers in what were known as “Freak Offs.”
They said he used videos of the attacks as collateral to threaten victims, and they said he also physically assaulted women and others by striking, punching, dragging and kicking them.
Prosecutors said defense claims that the government leaked a video of Combs assaulting his ex-girlfriend Cassie at a Los Angeles hotel hallway on March 5, 2016, to CNN were not true.
They said defense lawyers were engaged in a “bald attempt to suppress a damning piece of evidence against him — a video of him violently beating a victim.”
In May, Combs posted a video statement in which he said he took “full responsibility” for his actions in the video against Cassie, an R&B singer whose legal name is Casandra Ventura. She sued him last November, alleging years of sexual, physical and emotional abuse. The lawsuit was settled the next day.
“I was disgusted then when I did it. I’m disgusted now,” Combs said in the video.
The Associated Press does not typically name people who say they have been sexually abused unless they come forward publicly, as Ventura has done.
Combs also faces civil lawsuits by multiple men and women alleging they were sexually assaulted by Combs during the last quarter century after being drugged.
Lawyers for Combs have asked that the accusers and their lawyers be ordered not to make public statements, saying they have already made “numerous inflammatory extrajudicial statements aimed at assassinating Mr. Combs’s character in the press.”
More than a dozen lawsuits filed in Manhattan federal court have been assigned to different judges, leading to varying early rulings on whether allegations were sufficiently made.
In one instance, a judge on Wednesday ruled that a Tennessee woman who alleges Combs raped her in 2004 when she was 19 must proceed without anonymity or not at all. The judge wrote that defendants have a right to investigate those who sue them and the public has a right to know who uses the courts.
A lawyer for Combs did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
Film academy adds handwritten ‘Pulp Fiction’ script more to vast collection
No one knew what Quentin Tarantino had in the duffle bag.
He and many other A-listers were gathered recently at the Academy Museum in Los Angeles for its glitzy annual fundraising gala. Tarantino was among the honorees. And as he approached the podium to make his speech, the bag did not go unnoticed. At the very least, it was unusual.
Then he opened it up and presented its contents: It was his original handwritten script for “Pulp Fiction,” with mistakes, misspellings and all. He was giving it to the museum.
“The script is legendary,” said Matt Severson, the executive vice president of academy collection and preservation. “No one was expecting it. This was not a coordinated effort on the part of the academy. This is Quentin thinking what can he do to make his stamp on the museum?”
It’s one of many high-profile acquisitions to the Academy’s vast film memorabilia collection that the organization announced Thursday, including original “Ponyo” art by Hayao Miyazaki, glasses worn by Mink Stole in “Pink Flamingos,” Kurt Russell’s Snake Plissken costume from “John Carpenter’s Escape from L.A.,” animator maquettes of Figaro and Geppetto from Disney’s “Pinocchio” and six storyboards from “The Silence of the Lambs.”
The organization has also acquired personal collections of filmmakers Paul Verhoeven, Barbara Kopple, Nicole Holofcener, Oliver Stone and Curtis Hanson, as well as 70mm prints of Christopher Nolan’s best-picture winner”Oppenheimer,” and David Lean’s “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Ryan’s Daughter.”
“We want items from the history of cinema that relate to all ages and levels of interest,” Severson said. “We are preserving this global film history. And it’s something that the academy has been doing since its founding in 1927.”
Some are coming directly from the stars themselves: Jamie Lee Curtis gifted her tearaway dress from “True Lies,” Bette Midler gave two of her ensembles from “The Rose” and Lou Diamond Phillips contributed the guitar he used as Ritchie Valens in “La Bamba.” Others are through estates and private collectors. Just last year Steven Spielberg donated his collection of original, hand-drawn nitrate animation cells from “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.”
Studio Ghibli, which doesn’t work with any other American museum, donated more than 80 pieces of original animation art by Miyazaki and Noboru Yoshida, as well as the studio’s Japanese movie posters and an animators desk used at the studio.
“To have original artwork from Miyazaki? It takes your breath away,” Severson said.
The Academy Collection consists of more than 52 million items — the largest in the world — spanning the history of cinema. Not everything is on display, but components of the Academy’s collection can be accessed several ways: The museum itself, the Margaret Herrick Library, the Academy Film Archive and online.
At the gala, Severson heard from the likes of Nicole Kidman, Demi Moore, Jeff Goldblum and Tarantino how passionate they are about the work the museum is doing. He was quick to point out that it all starts with the staff working to preserve and present all the items in the best way possible. That includes the film preservation team and the paper conservators who aren’t just binding books but restoring photographs and posters damaged over time, as well as the team who spent an enormous amount of time bringing the belt from the 1982 film “Tron,” which had partially dissolved, back to life.
“You may not be aware of the painstaking labor that goes into preserving those objects,” Severson said. “It is important to pass this knowledge on to new generations of creatives and young filmmakers and artists to understand the history of the art form.
“This museum does become a platform that showcases our dynamic history and not just the history of Hollywood, but the global film industry.”
‘Saturday Night Live’ taps Bill Burr and Charli XCX as hosts after the election
NEW YORK | Comedian-actor Bill Burr will host the first post-election “Saturday Night Live” with musical guest guitarist, producer and vocalist Mk.gee. Charli XCX is also coming up.
Burr, on tour with his “Bill Burr Live” show and who will join Kieran Culkin and Bob Odenkirk on Broadway this spring on a revival of “Glengarry Glen Ross,” makes his second appearance as host on Nov. 9.
Charli XCX will do double duty on Nov. 16 in her first appearance as “SNL” host and third appearance as musical guest. She’s fresh off the hit album “Brat” and two connected albums.
Mk.gee will perform as a musical guest for the first time. He is currently on a world tour prompting his debut album, “Two Star & The Dream Police.”
“SNL” returns Nov. 2 with already announced host John Mulaney and musical guest Chappell Roan.
The 50th season has featured Maya Rudolph as Kamala Harris, James Austin Johnson as Donald Trump and Jim Gaffigan as Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
—From AP reports
