The Pop Corporation

The racketeering case concerning Young Thug has taken a new twist. The RICO trial is already the longest criminal trial seen in Georgia, clocking up 18 months, and it doesn’t look like letting up any time soon. However, it has been paused indefinitely thanks to an alleged misconduct by Fulton County Superior Judge Ural Glanville.

The judge says that the trial won’t continue until another judge decides whether he should be recused – booted off the case to you – from overseeing proceedings. This all stems from the accusation from the defence attorneys that Glanville held a secret meeting with prosecutors and a key witness by the name of Kenneth Copeland, in a bid to pressure him to testify.

Unfortunately for Glanville, if this is true, it’s argued that it is not only improper, but also unconstitutional.

Initially, the judge said he would make public the transcripts of his meeting so everyone could see what was going down. However, he’s since changed course on this and now he’s leaving it up to another judge to decide. It all sounds murky as hell, but that’s the law for you, eh?

Young Thug’s lead attorney had raised the question about this, and refused to reveal how they found out about this meeting and as such, was done for contempt of court. Again, it all feels rather ridiculous, but if you’ve watched any amount of procedural dramas from American TV, you’ll know this is exactly the kind of nonsense that goes down. Thugger’s attorney Brian Steel now will spend 20 weekends in jail.

It’s been 100 days of proceedings since everyone heard the opening statements, the jury selection took 10 months, and people have been attacked in jail and the whole thing has been a sprawling mess. The prosecution aren’t even halfway through their witness list, which tots up to over 200 people and this trial, if completed, is expected to continue to at least 2025.

The prosecution says that Thugger is the head of a gang operation called YSL, and Steel says that Young Thug has “committed no crime whatsoever.”

It has been a controversial case which has seen prosecutors allowed to submit Thugger’s song lyrics as evidence, which of course, will wilfully ignore any use of metaphor or nuance, and has been roundly criticised by many.

What is interesting is that former US president Donald Trump is also facing similar charges and the Supreme Court are currently excusing him of various things, so as these two cases are oddly linked, it’s worth keeping an eye on both.