'I'm ready to go back to prison' testimony highlights Young Thug prosecution perils
The racketeering conspiracy trial in Georgia state court in Atlanta is entering its 63rd day of testimony with no end in sight.
The way prosecutors tell it, Deangelo White could have died when a man with an assault rifle opened fire near an Atlanta gas station nine years ago.
Then 18 years old, White called 911 in a panic after his friend Dexter “Pooh” Montgomery was shot in the head, prosecutors say, in a targeted attack orchestrated by members of rapper Jeffery “Young Thug” Williams’ criminal street gang Young Slime Life.
Now 27 and an inmate in the Georgia state prison system, White offered a different take on the shooting in Williams’ racketeering conspiracy trial in Fulton County Superior Court, where he defiantly testified after he said jailers threatened to taser him because he didn’t want to go to court.
The alleged attempted murder victim repeatedly said he’s “ready to go back to prison.”
“I don’t suppose to be here. I suppose to be in chain-gang prison. I don’t even know why I’m here. This aint got nothing to do with me,” said White, who is seven years into a 10-year sentence for unrelated robbery and hijacking convictions.
White’s testimony did not link Williams to Montgomery’s shooting, and he told Williams’ lawyer Brian Steel in cross-examination he’s never said the rapper had anything to do with it.
White also testified that he never called 911, and that the man who called 911 in a panic to report Montgomery had been shot in the head was not him, despite the caller identifying himself as “Deangelo.”
“I didn’t call 911. Listen: He could have died. He could have did whatever. He don’t got nothing to do with me. I’m still in good health. I didn’t get shot,” White testified.
“Mr. White, you realize you were a victim in this case?” Assistant District Attorney Christian Adkins asked.
“How am I victim? I aint get shot. I aint get hit,” White answered.
“The bullet came through the car you were sitting in,” Adkins said.
“I didn’t get shot in the head. Somebody else did. It was not me. My head look alright, don’t it?” White replied.
White’s combative testimony highlighted some of the problems prosecutors face as they try to prove their case against Williams and his five co-defendants, Rodalius Ryan, Deamonte “Yak Gotti” Kendrick, Marquavius Huey, Shannon Stillwell and Quamarvious Nichols, who are in jail without bail.
Much of the 65-count case hinges on the testimony of law enforcement officials, but it also depends on the testimony of former co-defendants who took plea deals and alleged victims such as White and Shay Bennett, who in 2013 told police about a gunpoint robbery and shooting inside her apartment but denied the report in her trial testimony.
Jurors also saw inappropriate text messages Fulton County District Attorney’s Office investigator Rasheed Hamilton sent Bennett, and she testified about feeling sexually harassed by him.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Ural Glanville allowed both White and Bennett to testify without their faces shown on the online live streams that garner hundreds of thousands of views each day.
Adkins made clear he understands the danger the White is in: He asked him about it in direct-exam after White made clear he wouldn’t testify to what he told police more than a decade ago, or to what they discussed when Adkins and an investigator met with him in prison before trial.
“Are there gangs that exist in prison?” Adkins asked.
“Of course. You know that. Everybody know that. The world know that,” White answered.
“And are people who are in prison, do they ever keep up with cases and something that happens in the courtroom?” Adkins asked.
“I’m not in a gang so I don’t know,” White answered.
The April 12, 2015, shooting that prosecutors say could have killed White is the basis for seven of 191 overt acts supporting the rackteering conspiracy charge. The man who shot Montgomery with an assault rifle is still in prison, and his accomplice, Williams’ former longtime friend Walter “DK” Murphy, served seven and a half years.
Murphy was four months out of prison when the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office announced a grand jury indictment charging him with rackteering conspiracy for an alleged organized crime spree that began when he was a young teenager promoting Williams as an up-and-coming rapper. Murphy turned himself in and took a plea deal in December 2022 that released him from custody and required his testimony in trial.
He followed White on the witness stand last week, and their back-to-back testimony drew huge attention online.
I gained 15,000 TikTok followers in two days, and I expect I’ll surpass 100,000 total followers by early next week. My YouTube channel also continues to flourish as word spreads that it is the video hub for all things YSL trial. You can check it out here.
The trial continues to move at a glacial pace. Judge Glanville has been yelling at the attorneys more frequently, mostly about preparation, and he on Wednesday blocked prosecutors from introducing previous statements from White because he said they weren’t timely disclosed.
Then at the end of the day, he told the lawyers they’d probably be jailed if they were in federal court.
The trial is to continue Thursday morning, and I’ll be streaming on YouTube as always.
In other news, I appeared on Scripps News the other night to discuss the criminal case against the ex-interpreter for Major League Baseball star Shohei Ohtani.
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