© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: 76th Cannes Movie Competition – Idol Out of Competitors Screening – Purple Carpet Arrivals – Cannes, France Could 22, 2023 Travis Scott poses. REUTERS/Sarah Meyssonnier/File Picture
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Written by Jack Quinn and Mike Spector
(Reuters) – A Texas grand jury on Thursday declined to indict rapper Travis Scott and 5 others in reference to a 2021 music competition mob that killed 10 and injured hundreds, prosecutors mentioned.
Harris County District Legal professional Kim Ogg mentioned the grand jury listening to was the end result of a 19-month investigation into the tragedy at Scott’s Astroworld competition in November 2021.
“Our investigators and prosecutors did every part they might to get the grand jury to the reality,” Ogg mentioned.
Scott’s lawyer, Kent Schafer, mentioned the outcomes verify that Scott shouldn’t be answerable for the tragedy on the competition.
“Now that this chapter is closed, we hope that the federal government’s efforts will concentrate on what issues most — stopping heartbreaking tragedies like Astroworld from taking place once more,” Schafer mentioned in an announcement.
5 others, together with Stay Nation competition supervisor Silberstein, had been additionally cleared.
“Brent did every part he might to make the competition protected,” mentioned Silberstein’s lawyer, Christopher Downey.
Attorneys for the others couldn’t instantly be reached Thursday.
The investigation comes within the wake of a lethal fan outburst at Astroworld in Houston, the place hundreds had been injured when an overflow viewers entered the stage. Ten individuals died from compression asphyxiation, together with a 10-year-old boy.
The tragedy sparked a wave of lawsuits in opposition to Scott and the competition’s organizers, together with leisure big Stay Nation, which merged with Ticketmaster in 2010.
The plaintiffs allege that Scott, Stay Nation and greater than two dozen different defendants allowed too many individuals into the venue regardless of understanding the chance as a result of they wished the live performance to seem packed.
At the very least 4,900 followers had been injured, in accordance with legal professionals representing victims in lawsuits in opposition to Scott and the organizers.
The instances had been consolidated in Texas state court docket in a course of often called interdistrict litigation that streamlines the dealing with of comparable lawsuits.
In October 2022, the household of a kind of killed settled on undisclosed phrases with Scott, Stay Nation and others.
Different lawsuits stay pending, together with one filed by the household of a slain 10-year-old boy.
