Tory Lanez sentenced to 10 years in prison for shooting Megan Thee Stallion
Rapper Tory Lanez was sentenced to 10 years in prison for the 2020 shooting of Megan Thee Stallion.
The sentence for the 31-year-old Canadian rapper, whose legal name is Daystar Peterson, was handed down Tuesday after several delays. Lanez was given about 10 months of credit for time he's served since his conviction in December.
Lanez's lawyers plan to appeal the verdict and to attempt to have him released on bail while they do.
Judge David Herriford was expected to deliver Lanez' sentence on Monday, but the proceedings turned into a marathon two-day session after the judge had attorneys for both sides argue each factor of his potential sentence and allowed seven witnesses, including Lanez's father and the mother of his 6-year-old son, to give statements on behalf of Lanez. Megan also issued a victim impact statement Monday, read by Deputy District Attorney Kathy Ta, stating she "will never be the same."
Lanez's sentencing hearing was originally scheduled for January, but was rescheduled when he hired new attorneys and again after his legal team filed a motion for a new trial. The motion was denied in May.
Tuesday brought an end to a dramatic trial that created a cultural firestorm in the hip-hop community, churning up issues including the reluctance of Black victims to speak to police, gender politics in hip-hop, online toxicity, protecting Black women and the ramifications of misogynoir, a particular brand of misogyny Black women experience.
Tory Lanez asks judge for mercy, says he still cares for Megan Thee Stallion 'to this day'
Tory Lanez asked the judge for mercy just before he delivered his sentence. Lanez, who said at Tuesday's sentencing that he took full responsibility for "everything I did wrong that night," requested either probation or a minimal prison sentence.
"If I could turn back the series of events that night and change them, I would," Lanez said. "The victim was my friend. The victim is someone I still care for to this day."
Herriford said it was "difficult to reconcile" the kind, charitable person and good father many people described Lanez as being during the sentencing hearing with the person who fired the gun at Megan. "Actions have consequences, and there are no winners in this case," the judge said.
"We’re extremely disappointed," Lanez’s lead attorney Jose Baez said outside the courthouse. "I have seen vehicular homicide and other cases where there’s death, and the defendant still gets less than 10 years."
Baez called the sentence "really just another example of someone being punished for their celebrity status and someone being utilized to set an example. And he’s not an example. He’s a human being."
Megan Thee Stallion has 'not experienced a single day of peace' after Tory Lanez shot her, she says in written statement
In a written statement Monday, Megan Thee Stallion said she has suffered daily since Lanez shot her in the feet three years ago.
"Since I was viciously shot by the defendant, I have not experienced a single day of peace," Megan said in a statement read by Ta. "Slowly but surely, I'm healing and coming back, but I will never be the same."
Lanez was found guilty of three felonies – assault with a semiautomatic firearm, having a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle and discharging a firearm with gross negligence – in December for leaving the rapper wounded with bullet fragments in her feet.
Megan, who testified during the trial, said she struggled with whether she would appear to give the statement in person, but said she "simply could not bring myself to be in a room with Tory again." She asked that her absence not be taken as a sign of indifference and urged the judge to issue a stiff sentence.
Tory Lanez gets support at sentencing hearing from Iggy Azalea, dad Sonstar, more
Lanez's father grew emotional in court Monday as he described his son losing his mother at age 11. Sonstar Peterson, a Christian minister, choked back tears as he talked about his wife, Luella, dying just a few days after showing the first symptoms of a rare blood disorder.
"I don't think anybody ever gets over that," said Peterson about Daystar's reaction. "But his music became his outlet."
Several others gave statements on Lanez's character and charitable giving. Dozens more wrote letters to Herriford, including the mother of Lanez's young son, who spoke of his qualities as a father, and rapper Iggy Azalea, who asked Herriford to hand down a sentence that was "transformative, not life-destroying."
The judge said Lanez's son, who is about 6 years old, also wrote him a handwritten letter, but he did not describe it further.
What did Tory Lanez do? Jury found him guilty of shooting Megan Thee Stallion
The jury of seven women and five men deliberated for a day and a half before convicting Lanez.
Following months of speculation and publicity surrounding the incident, prosecutors charged Lanez with felony assault in October 2020. Lanez pleaded not guilty in November 2020.
The Canadian rapper's shooting trial began Dec. 12, 2022, more than two years after Megan Thee Stallion accused the R&B artist of inflicting "great bodily injury" toward her. In a criminal complaint, prosecutors said Lanez fired a gun at a victim identified as "Megan P." after she got out of an SUV during an argument in the Hollywood Hills on July 12, 2020. (Megan’s legal name is Megan Pete.)
What evidence did prosecutors have against Tory Lanez?
The trial included testimony from Megan Thee Stallion, her former friend Kelsey Harris and eyewitness Sean Kelly.
During her testimony, Harris, a witness to the alleged shooting, invoked her Fifth Amendment right to not provide testimony that could be self-incriminating, according to Rolling Stone. On the stand, Harris denied that she herself had fired the gun, but wouldn't say Lanez did. When confronted with a text she sent to Megan's manager that read "Help. Tory shot meg. 911," Harris said she only assumed Lanez had done the shooting.
Kelly was called by the defense, but both sides argued his account favored them. Lanez' legal team reportedly chose Kelly to serve as a witness because he told a defense investigator in 2021 that he initially saw a muzzle flash – the light flash triggered by a bullet being propelled out of a gun – near a woman's hand during a physical altercation between Megan and Kelsey, though his testimony seemingly backed up Megan's claim that Lanez shot at her several times.
According to Rolling Stone, Kelly testified that he never saw a gun, but saw one flash near a woman's hand, then "assumed" Lanez (who Kelly identified as the "short" guy, compared to the group's taller driver) took the gun from the woman after a physical altercation because he was then "firing everywhere."
Both the prosecution and defense called on DNA experts during the trial, according to Rolling Stone. Police were also unable to recover DNA or fingerprints from the gun used in the shooting, The Associated Press reported in December.
Tory Lanez sentencing postponed, Megan Thee Stallion describes mental distress
Prosecutors want Tory Lanez to serve 13 years, defense attorneys push for probation in sentencing memos
On June 6, Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón submitted a sentencing memorandum, recommending Lanez be sentenced to 13 years in state prison. The district attorney's office also cited his "lack of remorse as a basis to deny probation."
In the 12-page memo, first reported and obtained by reporter Meghann Cuniff, prosecutors wrote, "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," prosecutors continued.
In the sentencing memorandum, Gascón and Deputy District Attorneys Kathy Ta and Alexander Bott said Lanez "not only lacks remorse, he is clearly incapable of accepting any responsibility for his own actions."
The prosecutors referenced Lanez's claims about the incident on social media and his "full-length album with several songs about the shooting" as examples.
"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," they wrote.
Lawyers for Lanez said in their own sentencing memo that he should get only probation and be released from jail to enter a residential substance abuse program.
They say the evidence that led to his conviction was "questionable at best" and that his lack of remorse should therefore not be a factor in his sentencing. The memo says if the allegations were true, then alcohol abuse and childhood trauma would be factors.
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Megan Thee Stallion testimony in Tory Lanez shooting trial: 'He was holding the gun, pointing it at me'
Megan took the stand on Dec. 13 to testify she saw Lanez fire the handgun at her foot in the summer of 2020.
She said tensions escalated between them during a car ride after leaving a party at Kylie Jenner's house. She said Lanez "had an attitude" because she had asked to leave the party early. The rapper added Lanez then told her she needed to "stop lying" to friend Kelsey Harris, who was also in the car, about their past sexual relationship.
The pair traded barbs over their respective music careers, Megan said, prompting her asking to be let out of the vehicle. However, as she began to walk away from the car, Megan said she heard Lanez say "dance, (expletive)" as the singer shot her.
"I’m in shock. I’m scared. I hear a gun going off, and I can’t believe he’s shooting at me," Megan said. "He was holding the gun, pointing it at me."
After getting back in the car, Megan said Lanez promised her and Harris $1 million to keep quiet about the assault. Megan said she refrained from initially reporting the shooting to police, citing heightened tensions surrounding police brutality at the time.
"This was the height of police brutality and George Floyd, and if I said this man just shot me, I didn’t know if they might shoot first and ask questions later," Megan explained, adding that in the Black community "it’s not really acceptable to be cooperating with police officers."
Contributing: Charles Trepany, Edward Segarra USA TODAY; Andrew Dalton, The Associated Press
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Tory Lanez facing 10 years in prison for Megan Thee Stallion shooting
