Jury finds man who shot rapper Nipsey Hussle guilty of murder

Jurors found a 32-year-old man guilty of first-degree murder Wednesday for the 2019 fatal shooting of rapper Nipsey Hussle. The Los Angeles County jury also found Eric R. Holder Jr. guilty of two counts of attempted voluntary manslaughter for gunfire that hit other men at the scene. Prosecutors had sought two counts of attempted murder. Holder also was found guilty of two counts of assault with a firearm on the same men.

Holder stood up in the small courtroom next to his lawyer as the verdict was read. He had no visible reaction.

A jury deliberated for about six hours over two days before reaching the verdict. Most of their deliberations took place Friday, and they promptly came to their unanimous decision Wednesday, briefly reconvening after a four-day break.

Typos on the verdict form compelled jurors to briefly return to the deliberation room to correct and sign them while attorneys, reporters and others waited in the courtroom. No family or friends of Hussle were in the room when the verdict was read.

Holder could get life in prison when he’s sentenced on Sept. 15.

Holder and Hussle had known each other for years – they grew up members of the same South Los Angeles street gang – when a chance meeting outside the rapper’s Los Angeles clothing store led to the shooting, and his death. The evidence against Holder was overwhelming, from eyewitnesses to surveillance cameras from local businesses that captured his arrival, the shooting and his departure.

The shooting followed a conversation the two men had about rumours that Holder had been acting as an informant for authorities. Holder’s lawyer Aaron Jansen said that being publicly accused of being a “snitch” by a person as prominent as Hussle brought on a “heat of passion” in Holder that made him not guilty of first-degree murder.

Deputy district attorney John McKinney argued during the trial that Holder and everyone else in the conversation that preceded Hussle’s death were so calm that the “snitching” conversation could not have been the primary motive, and that Holder must have had some previous envy or hatred for Hussle.

McKinney told jurors that the nine minutes between the conversation and the shooting allowed more than enough time for the killing to be premeditated, a requirement for first-degree murder.

Hussle, whose legal name is Ermias Asghedom, died at the age of 33.