Prosecutors want Tory Lanez to serve a 13-year prison sentence for shooting Megan Thee Stallion, citing his “campaign of misinformation” aimed at humiliating and re-traumatizing the rapper.
“Words have power and the pen is oftentimes mightier than the sword. In this case, Daystar Peterson used both,” according to a memorandum filed Tuesday, referring to Lanez’s legal name. “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.”
“His online reach is worldwide (millions of followers plus casual observers) and the defendant’s statements embolden his followers so that they too have been complicit in re-traumatizing the victim,” the memo continues. “He is responsible for the effect of his words and his actions.”
The memo serves as a recommendation for Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge David Herriford, who is scheduled to sentence Lanez next Tuesday, June 13.
It details Lanez’s three violations of court orders before trial, including his breach of a protective order at the Rolling Loud Festival in Miami in July 2021 and his brief jailing in April 2022 for posting a DNA evidence report online along with derogatory comments about Megan.
It describes his “unprovoked attack” on singer August Alsina in Chicago last September and his recent false claims that prosecutors falsified and suppressed evidence.
It also cites Lanez’s “full-length album with several songs about the shooting” as an example of him “profiting from his crimes” while arguing his jail call to Megan’s now-former friend Kelsey Harris hours after the shooting is “tantamount to a confession.”
“The Defense argued unconvincingly at trial that the jail call and apology text were apologies about the defendant allegedly sleeping with both Ms. Harris and the victim,” the memo says.
“The entire jail call and apology text, when viewed together with the other evidence presented at trial, can only be rationally interpreted as an apology for the defendant shooting the vicim,” prosecutors wrote. “The defendant admitted guilt. As such, his lack of remorse can be appropriately considered by this Court as an aggravating factor.”
Lanez was arrested on a gun charge shortly after the shooting, which occurred about 4:25 a.m. on July 12, 2020, after he, Megan, Harris and Lanez’s driver left a gathering at reality star Kylie Jenner’s Hollywood Hills home. Megan testified that she exited the Escalade they were in while barefoot and in her bikini, then heard Lanez say, “Dance, bitch,” before he fired five rounds in her direction, emptying the clip of a semi-automatic handgun.
“The defendant approached the victim in the driveway. He apologized for his actions and begged her not to say anything. He convinced the victim to get back in the car,” according to the memo. “Ms. Harris confronted the defendant for shooting the victim, which caused the defendant to physically assault Ms. Harris. He grabbed her by the throat and pulled her by the hair before claiming down again. Ms. Harris sustained injuries as a result of the defendant’s attack.”
At the time, the rappers were “friends with each other, sharing a brief intimate relationship,” prosecutors wrote. Megan initially told police she hadn’t been shot but had merely stepped on glass. She was hospitalized overnight and surgeons removed bullet fragments from her feet.
Four days later, Megan told investigators Lanez had shot her, and Lanez was eventually charged with assault. The evidence against him includes a text message Harris sent Megan’s security moments after the shooting that said, “Help. Tory shot meg. 911.” It also includes his jail call to Harris and apologetic texts he sent Megan after he was released.
According to the sentencing recommendation filed Tuesday, Lanez’s use of a gun and the great bodily harm he caused are legal aggravating factors that make him ineligible for probation.
But Los Angeles Deputy District Attorneys Kathy Ta and Alex Bott also argue Lanez’s conduct after the shooting makes him incapable of supervision.
“The Court may also consider the defendant’s lack of remorse as a basis to deny probation,” according to their 12-page memo. “The defendant has failed to exhibit any remorse, which begs the question whether any of the apologies he directed to the victim in his text message and jail call were genuine and not just driven by an effort to maintain her silence.”
“Except for the jail call admission and his apology text to the victim back in July 2020, the defendant has spent nearly three years since that time waging a campaign of misinformation to re-traumatize the victim,” it continues.
Prosecutors Want Tory Lanez to Serve a 13-Year Prison Sentence
Prosecutors say Lanez “not only lacks remorse, but he is also clearly incapable of accepting any responsibility for his own actions.”
“The defendant’s lack of remorse is insidious, leaving this Court no assurances that the defendant will not repeat this type of behavior in the future,” they wrote.
The 13-year recommendation comes as Lanez’s lawyers are asking the state appellate court to disqualify Judge Herriford, who presided over Lanez’s two-week trial in December and rejected his motion for new trial last month. The 2nd District Court of Appeal, Division 3 in Los Angeles has not yet addressed the May 19 petition from Matthew Barhoma and Jose Baez, which accuses the judge of being biased against Lanez because of the way he handled the hearing on the new trial motion.
Barhoma and Baez, the prominent Miami, Florida, lawyer who successfully defended accused child killer Casey Anthony in 2011, were hired after Lanez was convicted and did not participate in the trial. They had until Tuesday to file their sentencing recommendation for Lanez if they wished to submit one. Instead, they filed a motion seeking to stay the sentencing hearing and asking for more time to file their memo, Ta told Legal Affairs and Trials in an email.
“We’ll be objecting to a continuance,” Ta said.
Lanez, 30, has been in jail since a jury convicted him on Dec. 23 of first-degree assault with a firearm, discharge of a firearm with gross negligence and three years for having a concealed firearm in a vehicle – unregistered.
Judge Herriford said last month that the sentencing hearing will be conducted in two parts because he first needs to consider possible aggravating factors, which are legal reasons to lengthen Lanez’s sentence beyond the state standard. California law requires judges to impose no higher than the middle range of the maximum sentence, which for Lanez is 22 years and eight months, unless aggravating factors apply.
Prosecutors filed a five-page motion on May 23 that asks Herriford to consider as aggravating factors Lanez’s use of a firearm and the great bodily harm he caused Megan, which jurors found to be true when they returned their guilty verdicts. They noted the “callousness” of Lanez’s crimes.
Tuesday’s memo asks Herriford to sentence Lanez to six years for first-degree assault with a firearm, with four additional years for the firearm aggravator and three additional years for the great bodily harm. The sentences for the two firearm convictions would run concurrently.
Prosecutors wrote:
“The People strongly believe that the dismissal of either enhancements alleged would endanger public safety and would not be in the interest. The defendant brazenly fired five rounds, emptying his gun, at a vulnerable victim. He did so callously, shooting a gun in a narrow residential street and in the early morning hours when most residents would be at home asleep. The victim was left bleeding, injured and traumatized. And since that night, the defendant has waged a campaign to humiliate and re-traumatize the victim through his actions and his words.”
The memo reminds Judge Herriford that he placed Lanez on electronic monitoring after he was accused of assaulting Alsina on Sept. 17, 2022.
This is how prosecutors describe the altercation:
“After Mr. Alsina neglected to shake the defendant’s hand, the defendant followed Mr. Alsina outside of the venue where a verbal exchange occurred. The defendant was accompanied by several members of his entourage and security team, easily out numbering Mr. Alsina. As Mr. Alsina briefly took his eyes off the defendant, the defendant sucker punched Mr. Alsina on the left side of his face, knocking him to the ground. The defendant was wearing several rings on his fingers at the time he punched Mr. Alsina. Mr. Alsina sustained injuries to his mouth, arm, and knee and was bleeding profusely. Mr. Alsina also believed he may have sustained a concussion.”
“The fact that the defendant committed another unprovoked attack on another person (August Alsina) while he had a violent felony case pending before this court speaks volumes,” prosecutors wrote. “The Court gave the defendant opportunity after opportunity to comply with the Court’s orders but the defendant remained undeterred by the Court’s efforts to regulate his conduct.”
Prosecutors say Lanez’s pre-trial conduct began with an October 2020 Instagram live video in which he accused Megan of pushing a “false narrative” and suggested she was lying about being shot. Then on July 25, 2021, Lanez showed up at the Rolling Loud Festival in Miami, where Megan was to perform after rapper DaBaby.
“During the victim’s performance, the defendant went through security clearance and entered the green room. These areas were within 100 yards of the stage where the victim was performing, in violation of the protective order. It was also brought to the victim’s attention that the defendant and DA Baby attempted to rush the stage during her performance. In no way was the victim previously aware of nor did she consent to the defendant’s presence at the venue when she would be performing. The victim was incredibly fearful upon discovering the defendant was at the venue and within the prohibited 100 yards. … Days later, upon being asked online, ‘Don’t you have a gag order?’, the defendant responded via his Twitter account, ‘I’m starting to not give a fuck.’”
Prosecutors also cite Lanez’s song “Money Over Fallouts” from his 2020 album Daystar, including the line, “Gotta see a couple of questions: how the fuck you get shot in your foot, don’t hit no bones or tendons?” They cite his “selective” disclosure of DNA evidence in violation of a court order. They also cite an “inflammatory” tweet he posted that suggested Megan “had ’spun’ the story and this case was about his sexual relations with two women.”
“The defendant’s tweets caused significant harm to the victim and she received numerous threatening messages as a result, including messages from the public suggesting that she should be shot,” prosecutors wrote.
The memo describes a similar approach by Lanez to his post-verdict false allegations about prosecutors and his false claims about what his own new expert said, which prosecutors say were made “without any basis in fact or reality.” They included a recording of Lanez’s April 25 Instagram voicemail from jail as an exhibit.
“The defendant actively invited harassment of the victim by spreading misinformation to his large following in an effort to galvanize the public against the victim and even the prosecution team without any regard to the dangers it posed to the parties nor the impact it would have on the victim,” prosecutors wrote. “The defendant has weaponized misinformation to his large following to such a degree that it has left a lasting impact on the victim.”
Prosecutors also cite Megan’s testimony at trial about how Lanez’s crimes and his harassment have hurt her.
“The defendant fueled those flames when he suggested in his derogatory tweet that this case had something to do with the victim’s sex life,” prosecutors wrote. “The victim testified that people called her a liar, shamed her over her sex life, and even sent her death threats.”
The memo quotes Megan’s testimony:
“I feel like I can’t even hold a conversation with people for a long time. I don’t want to talk to my friends. I don’t want to talk to my man. I don’t want anybody to ask me about this. I feel terrible talking about it. I feel like – I had started to feel like because I don’t matter, I do’t even want to be on this earth no more. I wish he would have just shot and killed me, if I would have known I was going to go through this torture.”
The sentencing hearing is next Tuesday, June 13.
What do you guys think? Should Tory Lanez serve a 13-year prison sentence for being convicted of shooting Megan Thee Stallion in the foot? Let us know in the comments.
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