Update (August 14, 2019): After three days of testimony, a Swedish court has found A$AP Rocky guilty of assault during a fight in Stockholm back in June.
Rocky, who spent almost a month in custody at a Swedish jail, was released earlier this month after the trial for his assault charges ended.
According to BBC News, the rapper was given a suspended sentence, which means he won't serve jail time, and has been ordered to pay damages to the victim. Two members of his entourage were also found guilty of assault.
“The assault has not been of such a serious nature that a prison sentence must be chosen,” the statement from the court said. “The defendants are therefore sentenced to conditional sentences.”
Though the plaintiff requested $16,000, Rocky and his co-defendants have been ordered to pay $1,300 in damages, reports The New York Times.
Original story: A$AP Rocky, born Rakim Mayers, has been released from jail and will be allowed to leave Sweden now that his trial for assault charges has ended.
#ASAPRocky judge says verdict will be announced on 14 August 2019. The suspects DO NOT need to remain in custody until then
— Maddy Savage (@maddysavage) August 2, 2019
We don’t know for sure if #ASAPRocky will choose to leave Sweden, but he has the right to. He mentioned in court today that there were some Swedish artists he would like to meet. https://t.co/zSsypFoXat
— Maddy Savage (@maddysavage) August 2, 2019
On Friday, a court in Stockholm heard the last day of testimony in the trial and said a verdict would be reached on August 14.
Mayers and the two other men on trial with him, Bladimir Corniel and David Rispers, have been held in Sweden since a June 30 street fight that led to their arrest. All three men pleaded not guilty and are facing up to two years in prison for allegedly attacking 19-year-old Mustafa Jafari.
"We pleaded and we begged and we said, 'Look man, we don't want to fight y'all. We don't want any more problems. We don't want to go to jail. We don't want to fight y'all. Please stop following us,'" Mayers said during his testimony on Thursday.
"I couldn't help but assume that these guys were affected by some kind of drug."
The case has continued to dominate international headlines because President Donald Trump has injected himself heavily into the saga.
Trump was roundly criticized throughout the week for sending top U.S. hostage negotiator special envoy Ambassador Robert O’Brien. Analysts said the move was purely for optics because Mayers was not in a hostage situation and any U.S. citizen charged with crimes abroad usually receives assistance from the nearest embassy.
After a large number of musicians and artists lobbied Trump to get involved, he repeatedly tweeted insults at Swedish prime minister Stefan Lofven. He openly criticized Lofven for not unilaterally releasing Mayers and made veiled references to debunked myths about crimes committed by immigrants in Sweden.
Give A$AP Rocky his FREEDOM. We do so much for Sweden but it doesn’t seem to work the other way around. Sweden should focus on its real crime problem! #FreeRocky
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 25, 2019
Trump and many of Mayers' fans have said the charges were only levied against him because he is Black. Since the trial started on Tuesday, more information has been released about what actually happened between Mayers, his group of friends and Jafari.
Videos shared on Instagram by Mayers himself and others show Jafari harassing and following them. Mayers repeatedly says on video that Jafari is accosting his group and trying to start a fight with them. Another video shows Jafari aggressively throwing a pair of headphones at Mayers' bodyguard.
But Jafari claims he initially approached the group to ask if they had seen his friend. He says that before he could even finish his sentence, he was violently picked up by his neck and thrown by Mayers' bodyguard.
Jafari says the bodyguard broke his headphones while grabbing his neck and that he threw the crushed headphones at the bodyguard because he was angry. According to his testimony, Jafari was following the group because he wanted them to pay for his shattered headphones.
A fight ensued where someone allegedly broke a bottle over Jafari's head before Mayers, as well as his friends, punched and kicked the teenager.
The Swedish lawyers for the Grammy nominee said Jafari was on drugs and had actually approached the group to ask them for hash instead of his friend's whereabouts. When Mayers' bodyguard saw Jafari's glassy eyes, that is when he picked him up and moved him away from the group, according to his court testimony.
During the trial, lawyers for Mayers repeatedly mentioned that Jafari had a criminal record and was originally from Afghanistan.
Mayers and Jafari testified on Tuesday and Thursday while other witnesses spoke on the stand on Friday. Swedish prosecutors have disputed the viral videos of the incident, claiming Mayers and his camp intentionally edited the clips to make themselves look innocent. Prosecutors have focused primarily on the bottle, telling news outlets that the bottle was what made the incident an assault.
Trump tweeted happily when Mayers' release was officially announced.
A$AP Rocky released from prison and on his way home to the United States from Sweden. It was a Rocky Week, get home ASAP A$AP!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 2, 2019
Swedish analysts told TMZ that the judge's decision to release the three was a tacit signal that they probably would not be convicted of the assault charge. During the final day of the trial, Mayers' lawyer put a glass bottle on the table and told the audience that if it was actually used in the fight, Jafari would have been grievously wounded.
