LOS ANGELES. – Megan Thee Stallion has said she will “never be the same” after being shot in the feet by fellow rap star Tory Lanez, as a judge prepares to sentence him.
Megan, a triple Grammy Award winner, wrote a victim impact statement that was read in court on the first day of the sentencing hearing on Monday.
She told his trial last year that Lanez shot her in an argument while leaving a party at Kylie Jenner’s home in 2020.
Prosecutors have asked the judge to give Lanez a 13-year jail sentence.
His lawyers argued he should just get probation and a drug treatment programme. He is expected to be sentenced later on Tuesday.
On Monday, Megan’s statement was read in court by Los Angeles County’s deputy district attorney. “Since I was viciously shot by the defendant, I have not experienced a single day of peace,” it said, according to US media.
“Slowly but surely, I’m healing and coming back, but I will never be the same.”
The star said she struggled with whether to give the statement in person, but “simply could not bring myself to be in a room with Tory again”.
Megan, 28, said she had been “tormented and terrorised”, adding that she “spiralled to a dark, angry place” when Lanez mocked her trauma.
“His crime warrants the full weight of the law,” she said.
Lanez, real name Daystar Peterson, has had seven US top 10 albums in the past seven years. Megan told the trial that Lanez opened fire after she mocked his musical talents.
Other witnesses who spoke on Monday included Lanez’s father, who talked emotionally about the effect on his son of the death of his mother when he was 11, and a prison chaplain, who said Lanez had been leading daily prayer groups.
The 31-year-old has been in custody since being found guilty in December of assault with a semi-automatic firearm; having a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle; and discharging a firearm with gross negligence.
The judge said he had received more than 70 letters in support of Lanez from his family and friends, including rapper Iggy Azalea, who called for a sentence that would be “transformative, not life-destroying”.
The shooting happened when the pair left Jenner’s home with his bodyguard and her friend and assistant Kelsey Harris in an SUV in the early hours of 12 July 2020.
Megan, real name Megan Pete, told the court she got into an argument with Lanez over their previous sexual relationship.
The row escalated and led to the pair insulting each other’s careers.
She said she demanded to be let out of the vehicle, at which point Lanez started shooting at the ground and shouted at her to “dance”. – BBC.