At long last, Meek Mill has succeeded in getting a new hearing steaming from his 2008 arrest on gun and drug charges.
The Pennsylvania Superior Court granted the new hearing for the long-running appeal, according to a June 4 report from The Associated Press. Now the rapper and his attorneys will get the chance to ask that his charges be overturned. Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner has previously agreed the conviction was tainted and Mill should get a new trial.
A hearing is set for July 16 in Philadelphia. Meanwhile, fans have been applauding online.
“She somewhere mad asf rn, that judge been blocking for years 🙌🏼”
“Mannn that’s great!”
“Look at god❤️🙌🏿”
Meek has had issues with the arresting officer on the case, Reginald Graham, whom the rapper alleged roughed him up while he was apprehended. That same officer has been accused by a fellow Philadelphia cop of lying about Meek aiming a gun at him and resisting arrest.
“We’re looking forward to the oral argument before the Superior Court of Pennsylvania and to, hopefully, having Meek’s conviction vacated,” said Meek’s attorney Jordan Siev in a statement to AP. “In light of the district attorney’s recent filing, where he supports the granting of a new trial to Meek and the recusal of Judge Brinkley, we hope to have this injustice rectified once and for all.”
Meek, who has retweeted various headlines announcing the news Tuesday, was released from prison in April 2018 after violating the probation related to the 2008 case in 2017. Common Pleas Judge Genece Brinkley sentenced the rapper to two to four years in prison for the minor probation violation of, among other things, recklessly driving a motorcycle by popping a wheelie as well as failing a drug test. It was Meek’s fifth probation violation within the last decade.
The rapper has taken issue with Brinkley, and throughout his imprisonment his legal team has tried to have the judge removed from his case, alleging she has a “personal vendetta” against Mill.
Before and since the star’s 2018 release on bail, Mill has become a fixture of the prison reform movement. He’s made it clear he plans to continue the fight for justice.
“I’ve got a lot of responsibility,” he told “NBC Nightly News” after his release from prison last year. “I’ve got a lot of important people depending on me. And I’m not talking about them people, the public officials, I’m talking about them men that’s depending on me going through the same thing I’m going through.”
