YNW Melly murder case: prosecutors accuse rapper of witness tampering as retrial is weeks away

YNW has been charged with witness tampering in his double-murder trial ahead of his retrial in November. 

Florida prosecutors have charged the rapper with making sure a key witness did not testify at his first murder trial which ended in July with a hung jury that voted 9-3 for conviction.

Jury selection in the retrial of the 24-year-old rapper will begin next week and opening statements are expected in early November.

Prosecutors said that members of the Bloods street gang, which Melly is speculated to be part of, passed letters between them to get messages to Blood members on the streets to make sure a key witness did not testify. Melly reportedly did this via using phone calls made by other jail inmates at his request. 

James Benjamin, Melly's attorney, said the tampering charges are a retaliation after he and law partner Daniel Aaronson accused Broward County State Attorney Harold Pryor of a cover-up.

Benjamin said Pryor, lead prosecutor Kristine Bradley and others hid the fact that the lead detective in the murder investigation reportedly asked another law enforcement officer to lie in a related case. Melly's attorneys have asked Circuit Judge John Murphy to dismiss the charges or, assign new prosecutors from outside the county as they plan to call Pryor and others from his office as witnesses. A hearing on those motions is planned for Friday (6 October). 

Melly's attorney, Raven Liberty reacted to the added charge, telling TMZ HipHop: "This is a transparent and desperate attempt by the State Attorney's office to distract the public from the deposition of an Assistant State Attorney who accused this case's lead detective and lead prosecutor of felonies by falsifying and covering up evidence damaging to the state's case."

Melly faces a possible death sentence if convicted of first-degree murder in the 2018 murders of two childhood friends, Christopher “YNW Juvy” Thomas and Anthony “YNW Sakchaser” Williams.

Prosecutors say Melly, after a late-night recording session, shot Thomas and Williams inside an SUV and he and Cortlen “YNW Bortlen” Henry tried to make it look like a drive-by shooting. Melly, whose legal name is Jamell Demons, remains jailed without bond. Melly's biggest hit, “Murder on My Mind,” reached No. 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 2019.

The news comes as YNW Bortlen, an associate of YNW Melly was arrested in Miami-Dade County on Monday (2 October) for witness tampering.