The three-judge panel weighing Tory Lanez’s appeal in the Megan Thee Stallion shooting case posed only a handful of questions during oral arguments Monday as Lanez’s lawyer claimed the musician’s 2022 conviction should be overturned and a prosecutor called Lanez’s argument “nonsensical.”
In her first two questions, Associate Justice Rashida Adams with California’s Second Appellate District focused on Lanez’s argument that prosecutors should have been barred from making explosive claims about Megan’s bodyguard, Justin Edison, at the start of Lanez’s jury trial. At the very least, the judge should have stepped in afterward to mitigate any possible damage, defense lawyer Crystal Morgan argued.
In their opening statement back in December 2022, prosecutors advised jurors they would hear from Edison directly. A deputy district attorney said Edison would appear on the witness stand and “tell” jurors that Lanez, born Daystar Peterson, met him face-to-face at a home after the shooting and confessed he was the trigger man during the alcohol-fueled fight in July 2020 that landed Megan in the hospital.
Despite the prosecutors’ promise, Edison did not cooperate with his subpoena, leading the judge to issue a so-called body attachment. That meant Edison could be brought to court in custody if necessary. Still, no one could find Edison, and he never appeared on the witness stand.
“Are you arguing that anytime a witness is subject to a body attachment, that any reference to that witness should be off-limits in opening statements?” Justice Adams asked, somewhat incredulously. (In a filing, the California Attorney General argued that prosecutors “had a good faith belief that the jury would hear [Edison’s] testimony.”)
“I think prosecutors should be extra careful,” Morgan replied in the courtroom Monday, with Peterson’s dad, Sonstar Peterson, watching from the gallery. “If they say they ‘hope to produce’ such a witness, that perhaps would be enough. But here, there was just no hesitation.”
Justice Adams appeared skeptical. “So, what was the evidence or indication that [prosecutors] did not have a reasonable, good-faith belief that the people would not be able to produce Mr. Edison at trial?” the judge asked.
Morgan said Lanez and his lawyers never received a copy of any interview that prosecutors conducted with Edison. “We cannot find where this statement came from,” she said.
When it was his turn to speak, Deputy Attorney General Michael Keller said there was more than enough “compelling” evidence to convict Peterson, without the need for Edison. And he said if Peterson’s lawyers truly wanted more information about the evidence prosecutors developed on Edison, they should have raised that question during the trial, before the judge ruled on whether Edison would be allowed to take the stand. “The defense’s failure in doing so precludes the claim from being raised on appeal,” Keller argued Monday.
Edison was mentioned repeatedly during the trial. Jurors saw evidence that Megan’s former best friend, Kelsey Harris, texted Edison just five minutes after the 2020 shooting in an apparent cry for assistance. “Help / Tory shot meg / 911,” the three-line text shown to jurors said.
Keller argued Monday that any trial testimony from Edison would have been cumulative. He said Megan and Harris both identified Peterson as the shooter, and that Peterson implicated himself when he called Harris from jail on a recorded line, and again later, when he sent a text message to Megan just hours after the shooting.
In the jail call played for jurors, Peterson blamed alcohol for his actions and said he expected that Megan was “probably never ever gonna ever talk to me ever again.” In his subsequent text to Megan, he wrote, “I know u prolly never gone to talk to me again. But I genuinely want u to know I’m sorry from the bottom of my heart. And I was just too drunk. None the less shit should have never happened and I can’t change what did. I just feel horrible. Cuz I genuinely just got too drunk.”
Keller called it “nonsensical” that Peterson was only apologizing for causing a “rift” in the women’s friendship. “He was clearly accepting responsibility for something big. Something that applied to [Megan] but not to Harris,” Keller argued.
Adams’s final question from the panel involved a Sept. 25, 2020, exchange on Peterson’s Instagram account that was admitted at trial. In the exchange, a third-party posted a comment stating, “People saying that Kelsey shot her.” Under that comment, Peterson appeared to respond, “That’s not true.” At trial, Peterson argued he didn’t author the comment. On Monday, his lawyer said it was a social media manager named Joshua Farias who posted the reply on Peterson’s verified account.
“If there were some sort of error in admitting that post, what would your argument be as to whether it was prejudicial or not?” Justice Adams asked. Keller said jurors heard the claim from Peterson that he didn’t write the reply, so they got to determine how much weight it deserved. And he argued it was hardly a make-or-break piece of evidence warranting a new trial.
“What we do know is that he did make the recorded [jail] phone call, that’s his voice,” Keller replied.
Keller also argued against Peterson’s claim that he was deprived of the right to confront Harris on cross-examination after jurors heard her recorded interview with prosecutors, where she corroborated Megan’s claims that Peterson was the shooter.
“Harris wasn’t excused as a witness,” Keller said, meaning Peterson could have called her back to the witness stand. “I see nothing that would preclude Harris from recall,” he continued. “So the confrontation clause just does not work on appeal.”
Morgan gave a brief rebuttal, saying “there was not enough evidence” to find Peterson guilty. “Even today, it’s still not quite clear what happened on that night,” she said. The judges took the matter under submission without saying when they plan to rule on the direct appeal.
Peterson, 33, is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for shooting Megan on a street in Los Angeles after a party at Kylie Jenner’s house. At trial, jurors heard testimony that Peterson pointed a handgun at Megan’s feet and fired five rounds while saying, “Dance bitch.” Megan suffered gunshot wounds to both of her feet and required immediate surgery.
Jurors convicted Peterson of assault with a semiautomatic firearm. Peterson raised 10 claims in his appeal’s opening brief filed in February 2024, claiming evidence was improperly admitted, that prosecutorial misconduct occurred, that the jury was improperly instructed, that the alleged errors were prejudicial when considered cumulatively, and that the court erred in sentencing him to the middle term instead of imposing the low term.
Prosecutors responded by arguing Peterson called no direct witnesses himself and declined to testify. Beyond his direct appeal, Peterson tried to overturn his conviction with habeas petitions claiming that new evidence or issues not known during the trial were sufficient to undermine the jury verdict. The appellate panel rejected those habeas petitions last week.
At Peterson’s 2022 trial, Megan gave three hours of harrowing testimony in which she recalled her “terrified” reaction to the roadside assault that landed her in the hospital. She admitted she lied to investigators and media outlets when she previously denied having been “intimate” with Lanez. She explained to jurors that the non-exclusive relationship left her feeling “embarrassed,” and ultimately, she considered it irrelevant to the actual shooting.
“Because I was shot, I’ve been turned into some kind of villain, and he’s the victim. This has messed up my whole life,” she said. At her lowest she thought, “I wish he would have just shot and killed me (rather than) have to go through this torture,” Megan told the jury.
The chief resident of orthopedic surgery at Cedars Sinai Medical Center walked jurors through X-rays showing Megan’s gunshot wounds on both of her lower extremities. He said doctors identified four metallic bullet fragments embedded in her feet and removed what they could during emergency surgery.
A man who lived on the residential street where the shooting occurred, Sean Kelly, testified that he woke up to the sound of an argument. Looking out a window, Kelly saw two girls who were arguing and physically fighting next to a car, he testified.
Kelly never saw a gun, he said, but he believed one of the women fired at least one shot because he saw a muzzle flash that seemed to come from her direction. But Kelly told jurors he also saw a “very agitated” shorter man “firing everywhere.” At the time the shots were fired, the man had an object in his hand with his arms outstretched, Kelly testified.
Peterson did not attend the hearing on Monday. He’s currently serving his sentence at the California Men’s Colony in San Luis Obispo, California. He was moved to the new location after he was stabbed by a fellow inmate at a different state prison in Tehachapi in May.
