A$AP Rocky’s lawyer is explaining the real reason Rihanna brought their kids to the courtroom.
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On Tuesday, Feb. 18, Rocky was acquitted of two charges of felony assault with a semi-automatic firearm, which came after he was accused of firing a handgun at his former friend A$AP Relli in a November 2021 altercation.
At the end of the weeks-long trial, Rihanna brought their sons, RZA, 2½, and Riot, 18 months, to court in downtown Los Angeles to support the rapper. Now Rocky’s lawyer, Joe Tacopina is explaining the Fenty Beauty founder’s decision, insisting it had nothing to do with earning sympathy.
“People were thinking it was a ploy, like some sort of maneuver to get the jury to feel sympathy,” Tacopina said during a Feb. 24 interview on The Breakfast Club. “The jury’s not feeling sympathy. They know he has a wife and kids.” [Rihanna and Rocky are not legally married.]
The lawyer went on to explain that Rih’s choice to bring the kids “was more because it was the last day of the trial.”
“She brought them to court because that could’ve been the last time he’d seen his kids for a decade or more,” he told the radio show, reminding the public just how much jail time he was facing. “That’s why she brought them. The prosecutor made a big deal of it in his summation, which I think was a fatal mistake.”
During prosecution’s opening statements, Rihanna walked in with RZA, Riot ,and an older woman, according to PEOPLE. The couple walked out to the hallway together during a break, each holding one of their sons. As the break came to an end, the family huddled up together, before Rocky handed his son back to Rih.
The Fenty founder then told RZA and Riot to “wish Daddy good luck,” before Rocky gave her and the babies a kiss, and she then left through a back door. After the break, the Savage X Fenty founder returned to the courtroom by herself.
It’s safe to say Rocky and his legal team grew close over the course of the trial, with Tacopina joking that the famous couple promised to name their next baby after him in an interview with Extra on Feb. 19.
“They grabbed me and they said, ‘Listen, our next baby [is] A$AP Joe,’” he recalled. “I said, ‘I’m gonna hold you to that!’”
