Three years later, the death of rapper Nipsey Hussle already has a culprit. A judge on Wednesday found Eric Holder Jr. guilty of five charges, who on March 31, 2019 ended one of the most promising artists in Los Angeles and who had been nominated for a Grammy for the first time. Holder, 32, has been found guilty of first-degree murder and two other counts of attempted murder for wounding two witnesses in the shooting outside Hussle’s clothing store, south of the city. . The resolution was adopted quickly, just six hours after the jury began deliberations, which lasted for two days.
No one from the family of the rapper, whose real name was Ermias Asghedom, 33, was present in court to hear the verdict of a trial that was postponed due to the pandemic. Holder had known Hussle for several years because they had both been in the Crips and Bloods gangs. The defendant will hear his sentence on September 15. It will be then that he knows if he will spend the rest of his life in prison. His attorney, Aaron Jansen, focused the defense’s strategy on reducing the time his client will receive in jail. His case was complex because of the mass of evidence pointing to Holder. Several witnesses, in addition to the videos recovered by the security cameras, made it easier for the jury to reach a resolution. Jansen has advanced the magazine XXLspecializing in hip hop, which will appeal for conviction once it is released in September.
The star witness for the prosecution was Bryannita Nicholson, a friend who was with Holder on the day of the shooting. They both went to eat at a hamburger restaurant on Slauson Avenue. Arriving at the scene, Holder saw Hussle outside his business, The Marathon Clothing store. Hussle, the son of an immigrant from Eritrea, had invested in properties and businesses in South LA, where he was a well-liked and respected character. Nicholson told the court that she approached him to ask for a photo of the rapper, who had debuted in 2018 with his album Victory Lap.
When the men met, Holder asked Hussle if Hussle had been going around saying he was a snitch. Holder and her friend went back to the car, where a gun was stored. Nicholson convinced him to put the gun away and they began eating while sitting inside the car. Minutes later, however, Holder abruptly left, saying that she would be back immediately. Bryannita heard the shots while she was in the vehicle. Seconds later he saw Holder walk quickly over to her and ask her to get out of there. The main suspect was arrested two days later.
In the two weeks that the trial lasted, Holder’s defense tried to explain to the nine women and three men on the jury the rules of the street and the gangs such as the Crips and the Bloods, who staged a bloody war on the streets of Los Angeles. during the 1980s. Attorney Jansen argued that being called a snitch by a public figure like Hussle caused Holder to lose the case. “This was a provocation that stirred anger and very powerful emotions,” the lawyer said Thursday. With this, she intended to convince the court that her client did not deserve to be convicted of first-degree murder, the most serious of the accusations because it indicates that the perpetrator acted with premeditation and advantage.
The prosecution responded to this argument by explaining that a total of nine minutes elapsed between the men arguing in the store’s parking lot and Holder shooting the rapper. In that time, District Attorney John McKinney said, the defendant had plenty of time to think about the attack, which involved 10 shots. The prosecutor also attempted to discredit the defense’s claims by asserting that, according to witnesses, Holder’s claim was not malicious. It is believed that the motive that led him to commit the homicide is problems or old rivalries.
“These bullets have traumatized an entire community,” McKinney told the jury, who has agreed with him with his verdict. “Crimes like this cannot be contained… Bullets hit people or walls and are stopped, but in a sense these bullets keep traveling. This neighborhood has not forgotten, ”added the lawyer in his closing arguments in reference to South Los Angeles, an area where Nipsey Hussle murals can still be seen. They are signs of a duel that still lasts.
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