A$AP Rocky cleared of assault charges

Rapper avoids a decades-long sentence

Rapper A$AP Rocky was found not guilty of two counts of felony assault at the conclusion of a trial in Los Angeles on Tuesday, AFP reported.

The musician, who has two children with singer Rihanna, had faced more than two decades in prison if he had been convicted of the alleged attack on a former friend in Hollywood in 2021.

There was commotion in the courtroom as the jury's verdict was read out, with the Grammy-nominated hip hop star, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, hugging people in relief as he was declared not guilty.

During the weeks-long trial, prosecutors said Mayers had shot a nine-millimeter semi-automatic weapon during a confrontation with Terell Ephron, also known as A$AP Relli, on November 6, 2021, in the heart of Hollywood, grazing Ephron's hand.

Mayers, 36, had insisted he had been carrying only a harmless prop gun.

The two had previously been friends, and had both been part of A$AP, a rap collective from New York, but had fallen out because other members of the group felt Mayers' commercial success had made him arrogant.

Ephron told the jury he had been lured to a parking garage for an encounter that was partially caught on grainy surveillance video.

He claimed that after the two exchanged words, Mayers pulled a gun from his waistband, put it toward Relli's stomach and said, "I'll kill you right now."

Ephron said two bullets were fired, with one of them grazing his knuckles.

Defending attorney Joe Tacopina said the weapon was "absolutely nothing more than a prop gun... a starter gun, a blank gun, a fake gun. It's used in pop movies and music videos."