A trial to come, two years after the events. American rapper Asap Rocky will soon be tried for shooting one of his former friends, with whom he founded the hip-hop collective from which he takes his nickname. The 35-year-old singer, who has two children with Rihanna, is being prosecuted for assault with a semi-automatic weapon. Real name Rakim Mayers, he pleads not guilty in this case, which dates back to November 2021.
Terell Ephron alias Asap Relli, one of the founding members of the A$AP collective, accuses the rapper of having shot him several times during a nighttime altercation in the streets of Hollywood, slightly injuring him in the hand. During a preliminary hearing last week, Asap Relli explained that his friendship with Asap Rocky ended up crumbling because he felt the rapper had “gone the melon.”
Rivalries between members of the collective
He accuses him of having forgotten the other members of the collective that they founded in New York in 2008 when they were in high school and which allowed him to achieve fame. According to him, the star talked about doing business with them without ever keeping his promises to his youth partners, some of whom descended into poverty and drugs. This fueled tensions between the two men, until that November evening, when their meeting in front of a Hollywood hotel degenerated into gunfire.
The star pulled out a gun and slammed him in the chest, telling him “I’m going to kill you now,” before walking away, Terell Ephron testified. Furious at having been threatened, the complainant followed the rapper, insulting him, who finally turned around to shoot him, according to him.
Asap Rocky’s defense rejects these accusations and assures that Terell Ephron, who also filed civil proceedings, invented this incident (partially filmed by video surveillance cameras) to try to obtain money.