Right now in Atlanta, the rapper Young Thug is
on trial for gang activities.
And it is not without controversy.
REPORTER 1: Atlanta rappers Gunna and Young Thug,
responsible for dozens of chart-topping hits,
they find themselves at the center
of a controversial debate in court.
Should rap lyrics be used as evidence in the courtroom?
The rapper's lyrics, one piece of evidence prosecutors
are using in the indictment.
(RAPPING) I never killed anybody,
but I got something to do with that body.
REPORTER 1: The prosecution citing lyrics
like that in the indictment as proof of criminal conspiracy.
The district attorney believes he
is the ringleader of the YSL gang,
and his lyrics are fair game.
I think if you decide to admit your crimes over a beat,
I'm going to use it.
[laughter]
That sounds like every mama I've ever seen in my life.
[laughter]
FYI, young people, when your name is Young Thug or Gunna,
you're going to go to jail.
That's--
[laughter]
You mumble rapper, but they heard
him clearly on that wiretap.
I know that.
The issue is, should prosecutors use
rap lyrics in criminal trials?
That's what I want to talk about tonight in our segment,
Long Story Short.
[cheering]
Well, since the '90s, prosecutors
have used lyrics as evidence against defendants in more
than-- over 500 trials.
But don't get me wrong.
If you rap about something you did
do, well, that's a confession.
If you rap about something you didn't do,
that is artistic expression.
And here are just a few examples of ways
rappers' lyrics get used in court.
REPORTER 2: A rapper named Torence
Hatch, known as Lil Boosie, was tried for first degree murder.
Prosecutors argued that a few cryptic words of one rap song
were, in fact, a confession.
REPORTER 3: Rapper McKinley Phipps
was sentenced to 30 years in prison for manslaughter.
Prosecutors presented spliced-together lyrics
from two different songs as evidence at his trial.
REPORTER 4: Police say Antwain Steward, a rapper who
goes by the name Twain Gotti, made a big mistake when he
recorded the song "Ride Out."
Police believe Steward brags through his lyrics
about how he killed Brian Dean and Christopher Horton.
Listen.
REPORTER 2: Some of the details match the shooting
happened on a porch.
No witnesses immediately came forward.
But others don't.
The time of day is wrong.
There wasn't a stabbing.
The caliber of the gun is wrong.
And there's only one victim mentioned, not two.
Based largely on that rap and on the accounts of two
witnesses given years after the shooting,
the rapper was arrested and charged with double murder.
OK, they got the gun wrong.
They got the stabbing wrong.
They got the number of victims wrong.
The only thing they got right was the porch.
And every Black person I know got a goddamn porch.
I mean-- and, by the way, not everything Black
people say in songs is true.
Like, Bob Marley-- he didn't actually shoot the sheriff.
[laughter]
He just wanted you to think he did so y'all wouldn't [bleep]
with him.
That's it.
Sir Mix-a-Lot-- he don't like big butts.
Nope, he's more of a boob guy.
Trust me.
[laughter]
And I'm a comedian.
I ain't never in my life seeing a rabbi and a priest walk
into a damn bar.
I've never seen that.
Art is an expression.
They use this to reflect Black life in America.
And now they're being punished for it.
But some prosecutors say, too bad.
REPORTER 2: David LaBahn is a former gang prosecutor.
He's now the CEO of the Association
of Prosecuting Attorneys.
I would say you can't have it both ways.
Cannot say that I'm rapping about stuff because this is
what I live in, and this is what I see every day,
and then come into court and say,
everything that I said in that rap is completely untrue.
Yeah, you can have it both ways.
It's called fiction.
And they--
[applause]
They have a whole section in Barnes and Noble's.
Read a book, bitch.
[laughter]
I don't even think that prosecutors think
their lyrics are a confession.
They just do it because it works.
And it works because juries are made of people,
and people are kind of racist.
As a matter of fact, in a recent study,
people were given identical lyrics
and told that they either came from country artists or rap
artists or heavy metal artists.
And, surprise, surprise, people were
more likely to think that rap lyrics
were written by a criminal.
Clearly, rap is just code for Black person.
Country is code for white person.
Heavy metal is code for, who the [bleep] knows?
I don't know what that is.
[laughter]
But there is violence in almost every art form.
But the one with young, Black rappers
is the only one that gets treated this way.
And this isn't even hypothetical.
There was a white woman on trial
for murdering her husband.
And she had written an essay called,
"How to Murder Your Husband."
And guess what-- the judge--
he wouldn't allow the essay to be
read in court because he said it could prejudice the jury.
[groaning]
She lucky Dr. Dre didn't write the foreword.
[laughter]
And I agree with that judge.
It does prejudice the jury.
The worst part about all of this
is that rappers have to listen to their lyrics
get butchered in court by people with no flow at all.
Hey, this is that slime shit.
Hey, YSL shit.
Hey, killing 12 shit.
Murder gang bitch.
YSL until we're dead and pale.
I never killed anybody, but I got something
to do with that body.
Ready for war like I'm Russia.
Slimeball [bleep] like ya, ya, ya.
Would I lie?
I got mob ties.
[laughter]
And y'all thought Nick Cannon couldn't rap.
[laughter]
So, look, there are a whole lot of problems with the justice
system in America.
But this is an easy fix.
Long story short, just stop using lyrics in court.
[applause]
That rhymed, but don't use it against me.
I was just kidding around.