Tory Lanez challenged the “vulnerable victim” finding in his appeal for his 10-year prison sentence for shooting Megan The Stallion, alleging that she had time to flee before being shot.
In the appeal, Lanez referenced Megan’s ex-friend Kelsey Harris’ statement to prosecutors that she saw Lanez reach towards the center console of a vehicle after he threatened to shoot Megan.
According to him, the singer argued that she should have recognized that "there were indeed signs that an armed individual may be in the vehicle,” and “thus had the ability to run or duck once she saw a gun being pointed at her.”
Under California law, a victim being "particularly vulnerable" can be an aggravating factor when charging someone with a crime.
On Nov. 12, the California Courts of Appeal affirmed Lanez’s felony convictions and 10-year prison sentence. The singer had argued that errors had been made during the trial for the 2020 shooting, and that the 10-year sentence that he received was too harsh.
A panel of Los Angeles judges rejected his claims and said that Lanez was not a victim of a miscarriage of justice.
Lanez’s lost appeal comes on the heels of him having been ordered to answer questions related to Megan’s defamation lawsuit against blogger Milagro Gramz after two failed depositions.
On Oct. 30, a judge struck down a claim from Lanez’s lawyer that a deposition testimony could hurt his appeal for his criminal shooting conviction.
“The focus of Mr. Peterson’s deposition is his relationship with defendant Cooper, not with plaintiff,” wrote the judge in a court order. “Thus, the court does not see how testimony regarding Mr. Peterson’s communications and relationship with the defendant would serve to prejudice his criminal appeal.”
The judge wrote that Lanez has to be deposed, and that he can use his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination “on a question-by-question basis, the propriety of which will be decided by the undersigned who will be supervising the deposition.”
Megan’s attorneys have attempted to depose Lanez two times so far, but haven’t been able to do it to their standards. In April, Megan’s lawyers deposed Lanez and wrote in a motion that he “feigned ignorance regarding the definition of basic words” and “pretended that the video equipment was not working despite prison staff confirming it was functioning properly.”