Prior to this week, it had been a relatively sleepy few months for the RICO trial of Young Thug and YSL. The Atlanta rapper has sat in a Fulton County jail since May 2022, alleged by the state of Georgia to be the ringleader of a criminal street gang (six additional felonies connected to gang, drug, and firearm violations were added in August 2022).
The case has dragged on since then — jury selection alone took 10 months — ensuring that only the most loyal Thug fans would watch the internet for updates, following court reporters assigned to the case and monitoring the video livestream, broadcast from inside the court.
Then, on Monday, everything exploded. Brian Steel, Young Thug’s lead attorney, accused Judge Ural Glanville of holding a secret meeting with the prosecution and a witness named Kenneth Copeland without notifying the defense — in almost all cases, Georgia law prohibits this kind of “ex parte” meetings from taking place.
Steel said a source had told him that in the meeting, Copeland agreed to take the stand after the prosecution suggested that he could remain in jail until all the cases of all 26 defendants in the RICO trial are completed.
Read more on thefader.com