LOS ANGELES: With Rihanna and two toddlers looking on from the audience, a prosecutor at the Los Angeles trial of A$AP Rocky told jurors during his closing argument Thursday that they have “one critical question” to answer.
“Was it a real gun or was it a fake gun?” Deputy District Attorney Paul Przelomiec said. “Nothing else is in dispute.”
The prosecutor said the hip-hop star fired at a former friend on a Hollywood street in 2021 and argued that Rocky was simply and undeniably guilty of two felony counts of assault with a semiautomatic firearm.
The defense, whose closing argument began Thursday afternoon, says the gun was a prop that fires only blanks and that Rocky took it from a music video set for security.
Rocky’s lawyer Joe Tacopina said the accuser, who is the key witness, is “an angry pathological liar” who “committed perjury again and again and again and again.”
Rocky, the Grammy-nominated music star, fashion mogul and actor whose legal name is Rakim Athelaston Mayers, is the longtime partner of the singing superstar Rihanna, who has attended the trial sporadically. For the first time, she brought the two sons they have together — 2-year-old RZA Athelston Mayers and 1-year-old Riot Rose Mayers — entering the courtroom quietly but dramatically a few minutes into the prosecutor’s presentation.
The boys, wearing suits, could be heard cooing as a prosecutor talked. Rihanna held one on her lap and tried to keep him quiet with a toy. During a break, Rocky walked down the hall, past jurors, holding the younger boy. Rihanna returned to court after the lunch break without the children.
Jurors will likely begin deliberating on Friday. Rocky could get up to 24 years in prison if convicted.
The jurors are not supposed to be aware of the possible sentence. But during testimony, Rocky’s tour manager, Lou Levin, said, “I read that he was facing 24 years,” after a prosecutor hounded him about whether he wanted to see his friend and sometime boss convicted.
The judge told the jury to disregard the statement. In his closing, Przelomiec said it was intentional.
“It’s interesting that Lou blurts that out when he’s not asked a question about that,” he said. “That’s clear evidence that Lou is trying to get out information to you that he thinks is prejudicial.”
Testimony ended Tuesday, when Rocky and his lawyers told a judge he would not take the stand.
The prosecution’s case rests largely on the credibility of the man Rocky is alleged to have fired on. A$AP Relli, whose legal name is Terell Ephron, became friends with Rocky in high school in New York. Both were members of a crew of creative types called the A$AP Mob.
Their friendship continued after Rocky gained global fame with No. 1 albums in 2012 and 2013, but by Nov. 6, 2021, their bond had become a beef.
They met up outside a Hollywood hotel, and scuffled once they saw each other. In a second confrontation moments later, Rocky fired the shots. Relli said his knuckles were grazed by one of them.
A$AP Twelvyy, who was with Rocky, testified that Relli was the aggressor, and that Rocky fired the shots as a warning to stop him from attacking another member of their crew.
Twelvyy testified that Rocky fired blanks from the prop gun that the rapper had been carrying for security for months, and that everyone involved knew it. Levin testified to the same. Both were clearly coached and coordinated, Przelomiec said.
“What they got on the stand and told you were lies,” he told jurors.
Neither side produced a gun as evidence. Despite more than three years passing, the defense didn’t say the gun was fake until the beginning of trial, which Przelomiec said “defies all reason.”
“There is literally no evidence of a prop gun,” the prosecutor said.
Tacopina countered that “there’s definitely a lot less evidence of a real gun.”
Relli also sued Rocky, and Rocky’s attorneys are casting him as a jealous opportunist. In text messages and in phone calls recorded by a mutual friend, Relli said he was going to take Rocky for millions.
Relli testified the calls were faked, but the prosecution played long excerpts during closings to point out that what Relli said on them was “exactly what he told you here in court.”
“Mr. Ephron wants to get paid,” Przelomiec said, “because he was the victim of a real crime by a real gun.”
Tacopina said the prosecution didn’t remotely prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt.
“They have not met their burden here,” he said. “Not even close. Because they can’t.”
A$AP Rocky trial begins closing arguments and Rihanna comes to court with their toddler sons
A$AP Rocky trial begins closing arguments and Rihanna comes to court with their toddler sons
Spain reverses ban on hunting wolves in north
- An amendment stipulates that capture and killing of wolves may be 'justified' in the event of a threat to the Spanish agricultural production
- Conservation group Ecologists in Action called the reversal of the hunting ban 'irresponsible'
MADRID: Spanish lawmakers on Thursday voted to end a ban on hunting wolves in the north of the country, three years after its introduction by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s minority leftist government.
Spain declared Iberian wolves living north of the Douro river a protected species in 2021, extending an existing hunting ban that was in place in the south over the objections of farmers who argued that it would lead to more attacks on their livestock.
Controlled hunting of the species had been allowed until then in the region which includes Asturias, Cantabria, Castile and Leon, and Galicia where the vast majority of the country’s Iberian wolves live.
The reversal of the hunting ban was introduced via an amendment to a law on food waste and approved with the votes of lawmakers from the conservative main opposition Popular Party (PP), far-right Vox, Basque regional party PNV and Catalan separatists JxCat.
The amendment introduced by the PP stipulates that the capture and killing of wolves may be “justified” in the event of a threat to the Spanish “productive system,” namely agricultural production.
It removes the wolf from a list of wild species under “special protection” north of the Douro.
Conservation group Ecologists in Action called the reversal of the hunting ban “irresponsible” while animal rights party PACMA described it as “the biggest step backwards in wildlife conservation in years.”
Members of the Bern Convention, tasked with the protection of wildlife in Europe and some African countries, in December agreed to lower the wolf’s protection status from “strictly protected” to “protected.”
Grey wolves were virtually exterminated in Europe 100 years ago but their numbers have rebounded since then to the current population of 20,300, mostly in the Balkans, Nordic countries, Italy and Spain.
US happiness sinks as more Americans eat alone: survey
- Finland ranked as the world’s happiest country for the eighth straight year in the World Happiness Report
- The United States fell to 24th place, its lowest score since the report was first published in 2012
HELSINKI: The United States fell to its lowest happiness ranking ever partly due to a rise in the number of Americans eating their meals alone, an annual UN-sponsored report said Thursday.
Finland ranked as the world’s happiest country for the eighth straight year in the World Happiness Report, with locals and experts thanking its grand lakes and strong welfare system for boosting its mood.
Afghanistan, plagued by a humanitarian catastrophe since the Taliban regained control in 2020, once again ranked as the unhappiest country in the world.
The United States fell to 24th place, its lowest score since the report was first published in 2012, when it recorded its highest showing at number 11.
“The number of people dining alone in the United States has increased 53 percent over the past two decades,” the authors said, noting that sharing meals “is strongly linked with well-being.”
In 2023, roughly one in four Americans reported eating all their meals alone the previous day, the report said.
“The increasing number of people who eat alone is one reason for declining well-being in the United States,” it said.
It also noted that the United States was one of few countries to see a rise of so-called “deaths of despair” – from suicide or substance abuse – at a time when those deaths are declining in a majority of countries.
The report surveyed people worldwide in 2022-2024, before US President Donald Trump’s shakeup of national and global affairs since returning to the White House in January.
Nordic countries all stayed among the 10 happiest, with Denmark, Iceland and Sweden trailing Finland, which slightly extended its lead over runner-up Denmark.
Meanwhile, Costa Rica and Mexico entered the top 10 for the first time, at the sixth and 10th spot respectively.
The happiness ranking is based on a three-year average of individuals’ self-assessed evaluations of life satisfaction, as well as GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity and corruption.
“It seems that Finnish people are relatively satisfied with their lives,” Frank Martela, an assistant professor specialized in well-being and happiness research at Aalto University, said.
It could largely be explained by Finns living in “quite a well-functioning society,” he said.
“Democracy is functioning well, we have free elections, free speech, low levels of corruption and all of these have shown to predict higher levels of national well-being,” Martela said.
He added that the Nordic countries also all have relatively strong welfare systems – with parental leave, unemployment benefits and mostly universal health care – which also contribute to higher levels of well-being on average.
Eveliina Ylitolonen, a 23-year-old student in Helsinki, said she believed that Finns’ focus on enjoying beautiful nature could help explain the consistently high level of happiness in the Nordic country, known for its deep forests and over 160,000 lakes.
“Nature is an important part of this happiness,” Ylitolonen said.
Jamie Sarja-Lambert, a professional video gamer who moved to Finland from the United Kingdom, agreed.
“Seems like everyone is a lot more in touch with nature, going outside and socializing, more of a community,” he said.
This year, the authors of the happiness report said new evidence indicates that engaging in acts of generosity and believing in the kindness of others are “significant predictors of happiness, even more so than earning a higher salary.”
They also noted that in general “people are too pessimistic about the kindness of their communities,” and that “the return rate of lost wallets is much higher than people expect.”
Nordic countries also “rank among the top places for expected and actual return of lost wallets.”
US music industry posts 100 million paid streaming users
- The US music industry passed 100 million paid streaming subscriptions for the first time in 2024
- For the third year in a row, vinyl albums outsold compact discs, selling 44 million versus 33 million respectively
NEW YORK: The US music industry passed 100 million paid streaming subscriptions for the first time in 2024, according to the latest report from the Recording Industry Association of America released Tuesday.
The US industry’s total revenue last year increased three percent to $17.7 billion retail, the report said, up half a billion dollars from 2023.
Paid subscription services accounted for 79 percent of streaming revenues, and almost two-thirds of total revenues.
Yet streaming growth has slowed over the past five years — in 2024, it increased by less than four million subscriptions, compared to the jump from 2020 to 2021, when it spiked by almost nine million — a trend that has pushed music companies to seek growth elsewhere.
Universal, for example, has been touting a “Streaming 2.0” vision focusing on avenues like selling products to superfans.
Music revenues meanwhile fell two percent to $1.8 billion on ad-supported, on-demand services — examples include YouTube, Facebook and Spotify’s ad-supported version.
Indie darling vinyl posted its 18th straight year of growth, and accounts for nearly 75 percent of physical format revenues that total $2 billion, the RIAA said.
For the third year in a row, vinyl albums outsold compact discs, selling 44 million versus 33 million respectively.
Vinyl’s popularity has grown steadily in recent years, fueled by collectors and fans nostalgic for the warm crackle that emanates from Side A and Side B.
The annual report from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, which represents global record companies, is due on Wednesday.
Hungarian woman who kept over 100 cats in squalor jailed for animal cruelty
- The woman in her sixties was found guilty of causing “prolonged suffering to a large number of animals” by neglecting them, the court said
- The defendant failed to provide adequate food or water to the animals while keeping them locked up in her “faeces-contaminated flat“
BUDAPEST: A Hungarian woman who kept more than 100 malnourished cats and a dog in squalid conditions in her flat was sentenced to 10 months in prison for animal cruelty, a Budapest court said Tuesday.
The case sparked public outcry and is thought to be among the Central European country’s most serious animal abuse cases in recent years, local media reported.
The woman in her sixties was found guilty of causing “prolonged suffering to a large number of animals” by neglecting them, the court said in a statement.
The defendant — who did not show any remorse — failed to provide adequate food or water to the animals while keeping them locked up in her “faeces-contaminated flat.”
As a result of the neglect, the animals “suffered from external and internal parasitic diseases” and were deprived of “self-sufficiency,” it added.
The woman — who resisted arrest in 2019 and was taken into psychiatric care — has consistently denied neglecting the cats during the trial, and stressed she had helped a lot of animals in the past, independent news site Telex reported.
But some cats died in the flat and surviving animals had to be put down after being rescued due to suffering from a number of diseases, the article stated.
The case became public in Hungary after an animal welfare organization, Helping Angels — which assisted in rescuing the animals — shared photos on Facebook showing the flat’s filthy conditions.
Both the prosecution and the defense have appealed the ruling.
“Champions” Queen win 2025 Polar Music Prize, Hancock and Hannigan also honored
- “Champions” Queen win 2025 Polar Music Prize, Hancock and Hannigan also honored
STOCKHOLM: British rock band Queen, American jazz pianist Herbie Hancock and Canadian soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan were awarded the 2025 Polar Music Prize on Tuesday.
The Polar Prize hailed Queen for their “distinctive and instantly recognizable sound that no one else can emulate.”
“Queen were not exaggerating when they sang ‘We are the Champions’,” it said in a statement.
Queen have sold more than 300 million albums featuring songs such as “We Will Rock You,” “Another One Bites The Dust” and “Bohemian Rhapsody.”
Founded in 1970, the band featured flamboyant frontman Freddie Mercury, guitarist Brian May, drummer Roger Taylor and bass player John Deacon. They played stadiums across the world — including a memorable performance at the Live Aid concert in 1985 — before Mercury’s death in 1991.
They relaunched in 2004 with a succession of new singers.
Queen share the prize with American jazz pianist Herbie Hanckock, a collaborator of Miles Davies among others as well as a solo star in his own right, and Canadian soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan.
Founded in 1989 by Stig Anderson, publisher and manager of the Swedish band ABBA, previous winners include Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Patti Smith, Sting, Elton John and Metallica.
