Rapper Ronald “Ra Diggs” Herron was sentenced to life in prison after his own lyrics were used against him in court.
Rapper Ronald “Ra Diggs” Herron
Herron was sentenced to 12 terms of life in prison plus 105 years after being found guilty of 23 charges against him, including racketeering, drug trafficking and gang-related killings.
“You guys sit here and continue to paint this picture that I’m the devil incarnate, the scourge of righteousness — it’s all crap,” Herron told prosecutors before he was sentenced according to the New York Times. “Even the most dim prosecutor could have secured a conviction under this atmosphere of guilt they built. They did all but point a big, red arrow of guilty up on that projection screen.”
According to New York Magazine, Herron was the leader of a Bloods gang entitled Murderous Mad Dogs, who “poisoned” Boerum Hill’s Gowanus and Wyckoff Houses with his sales of crack and heroin. Herron was also allegedly responsible for the killings of three men associated with the drug trade, Frederick Brooks, Richard Russo, and Victor Zapata. Herron was tried for Brooks’s 2001 murder, though he was acquitted after two key witnesses refused to testify, apparently because they felt intimidated. Not long after that acquittal, however, Herron was convicted of drug charges and ended up in jail.
Prosecutors used Herron’s own rap videos against him, claiming he would rave about belonging to the infamous Bloods street gang, firing weapons and dealing drugs. Herron’s lawyers argued that the lyrics were not autobiographical, but were commentary on crime, violence and drug wars in the inner city, according to NewsOne.
In delivering his sentence, Judge Nicholas Garaufis reprimanded Herron for his lack of remorse for his “abhorrent conduct.”
“You personally exacerbated one of your community’s greatest blights,” he said, as quoted by the Times. “You’re obviously an intelligent person, and an articulate person. You could have done something different. Instead you chose to lead a criminal organization and commit violent robbery and murder.”
Herron appeared unmoved, according to news reports, telling the judge after his sentencing, “You can sentence me to 10 life sentences; I’m only going to die one time, and God have mercy on us all.”