A judge has once again denied YNW Melly bond as he awaits his double murder trial.
TMZ reports that the rapper’s lawyers, Drew Findling and Carey Haughwout, slammed the judge’s decision to keep Melly behind bars until his retrial in January 2027. The pair compared the situation to a judge’s recent response to the treatment of the man who attempted to assassinate Donald Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
“The irony is that in the last few days, the nation saw a United States Magistrate Judge apologize to an individual accused of an attempted assassination of the President for his mere days in solitary confinement and not a word by this Court regarding the three years,” Melly’s attorneys told the outlet.
The man they’re referring to is Cole Allen, who, in late April, opened fire at the hotel where the White House Correspondents’ Dinner took place. Earlier this week, during a hearing, Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui shared his concerns over Allen’s treatment in prison and apologized. Allen was on suicide watch, subjected to repeated strip searches, and held in isolation from the prison’s general population.
“I am very troubled by what they indicate the conditions that you have been subjected to,” Faruqui told Alle, per NBC. “I’m sorry. It sounds like things have not been the way they’re supposed to.”
After the judge’s comments, Allen was removed from suicide watch, but has still been separated from other inmates for his safety.
As for Melly, his attorneys say he’s suffered “inhuman conditions” during his seven-year incarceration, with the last three in solitary confinement.
“In the collective decades of experience shared by this defense team, we have never encountered such cruel treatment comparable to what Mr. Demons has endured,” Findling and Haughwout added. “Numerous colleagues across the legal community have likewise expressed disbelief and outrage at the conditions imposed in this case.”
Melly was accused of fatally shooting his childhood friends, Anthony Williams and Christopher Thomas Jr., in 2018. He went to trial in 2023, though it resulted in a mistrial. His next trial is slated for January 2027.
