A Los Angeles Police Department detective testified Tuesday that he could not identify the alleged victim in the A$AP Rocky assault case on surveillance video showing the street at the time the accuser says he discovered shell casings from a gun allegedly used to shoot him.
Detective Frank Flores of the LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide Division told jurors he found no evidence that Rocky’s former friend, A$AP Relli, actually returned to the scene of the altercation between Rocky and Relli about an hour after police searched the scene but came up empty handed.
While police said they didn’t find any shell casings, Relli claims he personally recovered a pair of 9mm shell casings. No fingerprints were found on the casings Relli provided to law enforcement, Flores said.
Day seven of Rocky’s gun assault trial saw testimony from Flores and another LAPD officer who described Relli walking into the Hollywood Community Police Station two days after the Nov. 6, 2021, altercation, with two 9mm shell casings he said he found at the alleged shooting scene.
Prosecutors have been attempting to persuade the downtown Los Angeles jury that Rocky tried to use street justice and a gun to settle a beef with Relli, who came away with scraped knuckles he claimed were from a bullet shot by Rocky.
Pop star Rihanna — Rocky’s girlfriend and the mother of the couple’s two children — appeared in court for three days last week to show support for her boyfriend, but did not return Tuesday.
Relli, a former talent manager whose real name Terell Ephron, alleges that Rocky attacked him on Nov. 6, 2021, pulled a gun and fired twice.
Rocky’s attorney, Joe Tacopina, maintains the weapon was a prop gun from a music video that was incapable of firing real ammunition. The gun does not now exist, Tacopina said.
Asked last week on the witness stand whether he believed the gun allegedly handled by Rocky, whose real name is Rakim Mayer, was a harmless prop, Relli stood firm.
“Who’s going to come to a situation with a prop gun?” he responded as the jury looked on.
Rocky’s trial began Jan. 24 after the rapper-turned-fashion maven rejected a plea deal that would have required him to plead guilty to one of two felony charges of assault with a semiautomatic firearm and serve six months behind bars.
If convicted of both counts as charged, new court papers show he would face up to eight years in prison.
In his opening statement, Tacopina accused Relli of being driven by “jealousy, lies and greed,” and alleged that he invented parts of his story of being attacked to bolster an attempt to siphon cash from Rocky.
Rocky was arrested in April 2022 upon returning to Los Angeles from a trip with Rihanna to her native Barbados. Relli filed a lawsuit for assault, battery and emotional distress against Rocky four months later.
Meanwhile, it was announced Tuesday that rapper-turned fashion influencer Rocky was named a co-chair for the 2025 Met Gala on May 5 at New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute. This year’s exhibit, “Superfine: Tailoring Black Style,” focuses on menswear, with LeBron James tapped as the gala’s honorary chair member.
The trial is dark Wednesday but is expected to resume Thursday with the start of the defense case.