Legal professionals representing Chicago rapper Lil Durk in a murder-for-hire trial slammed federal prosecutors Thursday — claiming the proof offered was “missing.”
Lil Durk, actual title Durk Banks, was charged with a murder-for-hire conspiracy in a prison criticism filed Oct. 24 — the similar day an indictment was unsealed charging 5 others within the 2022 assault that killed the cousin of Quando Rondo, whose actual title is Tyquian Bowman.
In a press release launched Thursday, Banks’ attorneys claimed prosecutors’ use of lyrics quoted as proof was a “obvious indication that there is no such thing as a actual proof” and known as it “false and missing in essentially the most fundamental due diligence.”
“The actual fact is that Durk Banks is a Grammy Award profitable artist, a devoted father and a loving husband,” Banks’ attorneys added. “Mr. Banks has been intensely dedicated to giving again to the Chicago group he loves by means of his Neighborhood Heroes Basis and has placed on greater than a dozen charitable occasions over the previous couple of years.”
Banks was additionally charged with extra conspiracy and gun prices in a superseding indictment filed final month within the U.S. District Courtroom for the Central District of California. He faces as much as life in jail. Banks has been held with out bail since his arrest on Oct. 24.
Banks pleaded not responsible at his arraignment final month in U.S. District Courtroom in Los Angeles. A detention listening to within the case is scheduled for Dec. 12 and a trial date was set for Jan. 7.
Legal professionals Thursday stated Banks was “trying ahead to preventing towards these false allegations in court docket.”
The superseding indictment notes Banks launched a tune that “sought to commercialize” the taking pictures that focused Bowman and killed his cousin, Saviay’a Robinson.
The indictment notes that Banks’ report label, Solely the Household, doubled as a violent prison group whose members engaged in “homicide and assault on the path of defendant Banks and to take care of their standing in OTF.”
“Banks would place bounties on people that he and different OTF members wished to kill, together with [Bowman],” prosecutors stated. “As a part of the bounty, co-conspirators recognized and unknown … would pay anybody who took half within the killing of [Bowman] and/or reward people with profitable music alternatives with OTF.”
Additionally charged are: Kavon “Cuz” or “Vonnie” Grant; Deandre “DeDe” Wilson; Keith “Flacka” Jones; David “Browneyez” Lindsey; and Asa “Boogie” Houston. All 5 had been arrested in Chicago.
The defendants discovered Bowman was staying at a resort in Los Angeles on Aug. 18, 2022, in keeping with the feds. An unnamed confederate used bank cards related to OTF to ebook flights and a resort room, regardless of Banks insisting he didn’t need a paper path main again to him.
“Don’t ebook no flights underneath no names concerned wit me,” Banks wrote in a textual content message to the confederate that day.
Wilson, Jones, Lindsey, Houston and an unnamed co-conspirator flew from Chicago to Los Angeles, prosecutors stated. Banks and Grant traveled there individually on a non-public jet “to assist coordinate the homicide.”
Banks later used “coded language” to clarify “that he would pay a bounty or financial award” to these concerned within the taking pictures, prosecutors stated.
The plot was hatched in retaliation for the killing of King Von, a Chicago rapper who was Banks’ protege. King Von, actual title Dayvon Bennett, was shot and killed outdoors an Atlanta hookah lounge throughout an altercation with Bowman and his crew on Nov. 6, 2020.
Legal professionals representing Banks didn’t instantly reply to a request for particulars.
