MIAMI – A South Florida prosecutor advised jurors during closing arguments Tuesday that three males on trial for the 2018 slaying of rapper XXXTentacion had been “predators” who waited outdoors a bike shop to rob and shoot the rising star, escaping with $50,000.
Prosecutor Pascale Achille performed cellphone video clips the defendants allegedly took hours immediately after the killing that showed them smiling and dancing as they flashed handfuls of $100 costs. Michael Boatwright, Dedrick Williams and Trayvon Newsome are all billed with 1st-diploma murder and encounter required existence sentences if convicted.
“This is who they are. This is their real character. Killers that inside of 24 hours immediately after capturing the victim useless and stealing $50,000 from him, this is what they do,” Achille explained to the jury as she played the video clip. “Seem at how happy they glimpse. Search at how enthusiastic they search.”
She also played surveillance online video from the motorbike store and from in which two of them allegedly stashed an SUV that she says website link the men to the killing.
Protection lawyers were being to give their closing arguments Tuesday afternoon. The demo began a thirty day period back.
XXXTentacion. whose serious name was Jahseh Onfroy, experienced just still left Riva Motorsports in suburban Fort Lauderdale on June 18, 2018, with a friend when his BMW was blocked by an SUV that swerved in entrance.
Surveillance online video showed that two masked gunmen emerged and confronted the 20-yr-previous singer at the driver’s window, and one shot him regularly. They then grabbed a Louis Vuitton bag containing dollars that XXXTentacion had just withdrawn from the lender, obtained back again into the SUV and sped absent. The good friend was not harmed.
Boatwright, 28, is accused of getting the shooter, although Newsome, 24, is accused of being the other gunman. Williams, 26, is accused of staying the driver.
A fourth guy who prosecutors say was in the SUV, 26-year-previous Robert Allen, pleaded responsible very last year to next-diploma murder and testified towards his former mates.
Prosecutors say the adult men set out that day to commit robberies and experienced gone to the motorbike shop to invest in Williams a mask. There they noticed the rapper and resolved to make him their focus on. Allen and Williams went within the motorbike shop to verify it was him. They then went again to the SUV they had rented and waited for XXXTentacion to arise and ambushed him, according to prosecutors.
The rapper, who pronounced his title “Ex ex ex ten-ta-see-YAWN,” was a platinum-providing soaring star who tackled problems including prejudice and melancholy in his songs. He also drew criticism more than negative actions and various arrests, which include costs that he seriously conquer and abused his girlfriend.
