Fat Joe petitions to stop Texas rapper from being executed over his lyrics
Fat Joe is petitioning to stop a Dallas, Texas, rapper from being executed over his lyrics.
A man named James Broadnax was sentenced to death in 2009 for two murders, with prosecutors using 40 pages of handwritten lyrics against him.
Ahead of his planned execution next month, big-name rappers have come out in numbers to defend him.
One of them is Fat Joe, who recently sat down with CBS News to explain why he thinks lyrics shouldn’t be used as evidence.
“I just happen to know that hip-hop music comes from a place of creativity and imagination,” he said. “There’s nowhere on earth that the stuff that we write is actually real. So to see someone go to trial with the lyrics they used on songs that came from their imagination to be used against them is a crime in itself.”
Joe joins a long list of rappers, including Travis Scott, who have argued that the use of rap lyrics at trial was “unconstitutional.”
T.I., Young Thug, and Killer Mike are also among those who filed a joint amicus brief earlier this month.
Speaking on protecting rap music, Joe continued, “We have to definitely take care of our freedom of speech, our freedom of expression, and our freedom of imagination. The music talks to you. It’s hard for someone who doesn’t make music to understand this. The beats tell you what to write – sometimes it’s happy stuff, sometimes it’s depressing stuff, [or] sometimes it’s party stuff.”
Joe believes that deep down, prosecutors know that referencing lyrics is wrong. “I do believe that the prosecutors and the judges know that this is unfair as well,” he said.