Grammy-winning rapper Lil Durk, whose legal name is Durk Devontay Banks, walked away from a Los Angeles federal courtroom on Friday as a free man on paper though not yet in body after a jury acquitted him on all five felony counts in a high-profile murder-for-hire case tied to a deadly 2022 ambush shooting.
The panel reached its verdict after three days of deliberations following a two-week trial in downtown Los Angeles, one that drew scores of spectators, livestreamers, and celebrity supporters, including Machine Gun Kelly and Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, who appeared in the courtroom audience during proceedings.
Federal prosecutors accused Banks, 33, of orchestrating a revenge plot against Atlanta rapper Tyquian Bowman, known professionally as Quando Rondo after an associate of Bowman’s fatally shot Banks’ close friend and Only The Family (OTF) collective member, Dayvon “King Von” Bennett, in 2020 at an Atlanta nightclub.
Prosecutors alleged Banks ordered, bankrolled, and planned the intended murder as retaliation, and that a hit team was sent to carry it out.
That plot allegedly went catastrophically wrong on August 19, 2022, when gunmen opened fire near the Beverly Center in what prosecutors described as a daytime ambush. The shots intended for Bowman instead struck and killed his 24-year-old cousin, Saviay’a Robinson, who was seated beside him in a vehicle.
Banks faced charges including conspiracy, stalking using a dangerous weapon, stalking resulting in death, and two counts tied to murder-for-hire allegations.
Banks’ legal team, led by attorney Drew Findling, argued he had no role in the scheme, instead pointing to his former personal assistant, Kavon Grant, as the architect of the plot.
According to reporting on the trial, Grant and two other members of Banks’ inner circle struck plea deals and testified for the government about Durk’s alleged involvement. Banks himself declined to testify, and Bowman was never called to the stand.
Outside the courthouse after the verdict, Findling framed the acquittal in dramatic terms: “Twenty-two months ago, Durk and I made an agreement that we would make history with the greatest verdict in this country, and it happened today. Durk is not guilty of all charges.”
Two alleged co-conspirators, Deandre Dontrell Wilson and David Brian Lindsey, both affiliated with OTF, were not so fortunate. They were convicted of stalking and conspiracy to commit stalking charges but acquitted of the murder-for-hire counts.
Attorney Craig Harbaugh, representing Wilson, said in a statement, “We thank the jury for seeing there was no murder for hire. We are confident the remaining counts will not survive our pending motion for acquittal.”
The scene outside the federal courthouse turned celebratory, with fans holding “Free Durk” signs and cheering the verdict. Yet the human cost of the case was not lost on those closest to it. Banks’ father, who attended the trial daily, struck a somber note even amid the relief, acknowledging the grief of Robinson’s family.
Despite Friday’s acquittal, Banks remains in federal custody. He still faces a separate trial next month on racketeering, murder, and firearms charges, a case that was severed from the one decided Friday. A conviction on those charges could carry a sentence of life imprisonment.
Banks, who rose to prominence through Chicago’s drill scene, has notched seven top-five albums on the Billboard chart since 2019 and won a Grammy in 2024 for his hit “All My Life,” a collaboration that helped cement his status as one of hip-hop’s most commercially successful and legally scrutinized figures of the decade.
WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW
Lil Durk has been fully acquitted of orchestrating a 2022 murder-for-hire plot that killed Saviay’a Robinson, with jurors rejecting the prosecution’s case after three days of deliberation.
The win is only partial freedom; he remains behind bars, facing a far more serious racketeering, murder and firearms trial next month that could still put him away for life.
One legal battle is over, but the fight that could define his future has yet to begin.
