ATLANTA — An attorney for Young Thug wants to disqualify a prosecutor with the Fulton County District Attorney's Office — or make her available as a witness.
A new motion filed late Monday night accuses assistant district attorney Adriane Love of becoming an unsworn witness during her series of questions on Friday.
"Prosecutor Love has become a witness in this case solely because Prosecutor Love has, for some reason that only she is aware, voluntarily and continuously injected herself as an unsworn witness in this case for which no other witness, investigator or otherwise, is available to answer the questions that Prosecutor Love has forced Mr. Williams to ask," attorney Brian Steel wrote in the filing.
Steel represents rapper Young Thug, whose legal name is Jeffrey Williams. He and 27 others were originally indicted and accused of crimes tied to an alleged gang called "Young Slime Life" -- YSL. His attorneys maintain YSL is solely his record label and rap brand -- "Young Stoner Life" -- and that what's really been put on trial is his art.
The trial began in November after nearly a yearlong jury selection process, with only five other defendants remaining alongside Young Thug after the majority were dropped from the current RICO proceedings for various reasons.
The rapper has now been in jail roughly two years without bond.
"Mr. Williams asserts that he is entitled to cross-examination of the prosecutor," Steel said in court Friday. "If not, I am moving for a mistrial because I cannot cross-examine an unsworn witness."
11Alive reached out to the Fulton County District Attorney's Office on Monday morning with Steel's allegations. They had not yet responded as of Tuesday morning; Judge Ural Glanville gave the DA's Office until Wednesday, April 3 to respond to the court in writing.
"The reason we cross-examine people is so that the jury can evaluate how truthful or untruthful their statements are. It goes to the weight of the testimony," criminal defense attorney Joshua Schiffer told 11Alive. "Brian Steel is attempting to make ADA Love a witness because her statements were part of the cross-examination of State's witness, Ms. Bennett."
Bennett was on the stand last week testifying about a break-in incident at her apartment in 2013 that prosecutors allege Young Thug was tied to.
Steel's filing lists four examples where the defense would like the opportunity to question ADA Love, saying "there is no other witness from whom similar information can be obtained."
It asks the judge for a hearing on the motion and a conclusion that would remove/disqualify Prosecutor Love as a trial prosecutor on this case; make Prosecutor Love available as a witness; or declare a mistrial "based upon prosecutorial misconduct by Prosecutor Love injecting herself into the controversy at issue, placing her credibility at issue to now be decided by the trial jury which creates an unfair, unsworn witness problem for Mr. Williams."
"Taking the district attorney out of their role as an advocate for the state and turning them into the witness might impact her ability — DA Love — to continue on in the case and would obviously change her relationship with the jurors," Schiffer said. "Both sides could have very persuasive arguments."