Lil Durk just scored a major legal victory.
The Chicago rapper, already facing trial in a federal murder-for-hire case, was battling to toss out several newly-added racketeering counts. And on Tuesday (July 14), he won.
The judge in the case, Michael W. Fitzgerald, ordered that the racketeering charges, added in early June, will be severed from Durk’s case and tried later. The trial on the remaining counts will begin, as previously scheduled, on August 20.
Fitzgerald’s decision seemed to be anticipated by his demeanor at a court hearing earlier on Tuesday, when both sides weighed in on Durk’s request to sever the charges.
Rolling Stone’s Nancy Dillon shared on X that Judge Fitzgerald was “on fire, very frustrated with prosecution, and seemed to be leaning heavily” towards deciding in Durk’s favor.
Durk is accused by prosecutors of organizing a murder-for-hire plot aimed at his rap rival Quando Rondo that ended in the death of Quando’s cousin, Saviay’a Robinson.
But just last month, as mentioned, prosecutors added two racketeering charges alleging that Durk was at the head of a criminal enterprise. Read our breakdown of those charges here.
At the heart of the new charges were two incidents in which Durk allegedly organized violence: a 2019 shooting in Atlanta, and a January 2022 killing in Chicago. Per Judge Fitzgerald’s ruling, the latter will not play any part in Durk’s trial.
“The Government chose to withdraw evidence of the ‘Chicago incident’ in the Los Angeles trial,” Judge Fitzgerald wrote.
Judge Fitzgerald made clear that there will be a separate trial on the racketeering charges once Durk’s initial trial is over. No date for that has yet been set.
Durk’s attorneys had argued that the racketeering charges should be dismissed entirely or, failing that, be tried separately. They wrote in a recent filing that by adding the charges, the prosecution was “sandbagging” the defense “by switching its…theories” right before the trial is about to start. In addition, they argued that introducing so much new evidence so close to the start of proceedings would force them delay the trial date, and thus rob their client of his right to a speedy trial.
Lil Durk and his codefendants are set to be tried on the remaining charges beginning on August 20 at 8:30 a.m.
Durk’s attorney Drew Findling told Complex: “We are very happy with the court’s order. For 21 months, we have been unwavering in our commitment to Mr. Banks and his innocence, and look forward to an August 20, 2026 trial.”
