YNW Melly’s double-murder case has been ripe with drama, and prosecutors are now hoping to minimize that proposing the names of jurors remain confidential for the duration of the proceedings.
On Tuesday (October 10), South Florida Sun Sentinel reported that the Broward County State Attorney’s Office filed a motion keep the names of every juror sealed throughout the retrial.
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“There is evidence that suggests potential or seated jurors in the upcoming jury trial will be subjected to improper outside influences or harassment,” lead prosecutor Kristine Bradley wrote in her petition to Judge John Murphy III.
She has instead proposed that they each be assigned a number. This was most likely prompted by Miami police finding a notebook with information about each juror in the 24-year-old’s first trial when they searched co-defendant YNW Bortlen’s home for witness tampering last week.
Prosecutors want juror names kept under wraps in upcoming YNW Melly murder trial https://t.co/Pc0GGr6fsL
— South Florida Sun Sentinel (@SunSentinel) October 10, 2023
Earlier this month, the “Murder On My Mind” rapper was also written up for witness tampering just days before his retrial was scheduled to begin. An affidavit obtained by XXL at the start of October confirmed that he has now been hit with the additional charge.
The duo have been accused of using an inmate named Terrence Mathis to communicate on the phone with Melly’s ex-girlfriend, Mariah Hamilton, and her mother, Felicia Holmes, to convince them not to testify in the case.
He currently stands accused of murdering his friends, YNW Sakchaser (real name Anthony Williams) and YNW Juvy (real name Christopher Thomas Jr.) in October 2018, and then staging the crime scene to look like a drive-by shooting.
The first-degree murder charges took four and a half years to process through the legal system, with Melly being denied bond since his arrest back in February 2019.
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Judge Murphy announced in late July that the initial case had ended in a mistrial despite three days of deliberation. “These types of decisions, they’re hard decisions,” he said regarding the inconclusive final. Soon after, a retrial was ordered.
After several delays, Melly returned to court on Wednesday (October 11) to resume his defense.
