Just a week and a half after being arrested and jailed for attempted murder and criminal possession of a firearm, Brooklyn rapper Troy Ave released a mixtape entitled Free Troy Ave that includes several interludes culled from jailhouse calls to the outside. The intro, intermission, and outro contain several comments about the events leading to his arrest, including: “Pussy nigga tried to assassinate me, I took the gun, and turned the tables ’round like a G—R.I.P. my nigga, B-A-N-G.” He also professes his innocence repeatedly and claims that the case is a “minor setback for a major comeback.”
In the United States, there’s precedent for using rap lyrics at trial. In 2012, a Louisiana court ruled that Boosie Badazz’s use of certain language in “187,” which was recorded just hours before the victim was shot and killed, could be introduced into evidence in his murder trial. In New York, rap lyrics are regularly entered into evidence. Just a few months ago, a judge revoked aspiring rapper Sean Chung’s bail, remanding him to Rikers, after he posted a rap video on YouTube that contained a threat against District Attorney Richard Brown. Outside of the courtroom, a New York Times article in 2014 stated that the NYPD routinely monitors rap lyrics online to study the “pecking order on the streets and grudges between gangs that might have spurred crimes.”
Joe Budden: I’ll Beat The Sh*t Out Of Troy Ave I Got 50K On That.
Troy Ave: Me x Fabolous Smashed Every Woman Joe Budden Ever Loved (Wow)
