FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Florida rapper Jamell “YNW Melly” Demons was back in court on Tuesday for a motions hearing. The 24-year-old musician from Gifford listened to the testimony of the Miramar detective who accused him of killing his friends about five years ago.
Rappers Christopher “YNW Juvy” Thomas and Anthony “YNW Sakchaser” Williams were fatally shot while in a Jeep Compass on Oct. 26, 2018, after a recording session with Demons at a studio in Broward County, police said.
Detective Mark Moretti was assigned to the case after rapper Cortlen “YNW Bortlen” Henry arrived at a hospital in Miramar driving a bullet-riddled Jeep with Thomas and Williams dead. Henry reported there was a drive-by shooting. Williams was 21. Thomas was 19.
Moretti and Assistant State Attorney Michelle Boutros testified on Monday in court about how some cell phones were seized as evidence in the case against Demons. The defense claims Moretti worked outside of his jurisdiction and seized a phone that was not listed in the original warrant.
“We did not get all the data that we requested,” Moretti said in court about one of the phones he seized.
Boutros testified about the process Moretti followed to seize the phones belonging to Demons’s mother, Jamie King, and his girlfriend at the time, Mariah Hamilton.
Moretti allegedly argued Hamilton had abandoned her phone at someone else’s home and a Broward Sheriff’s Office deputy was present when King handed over her phone in Fort Lauderdale.
Demons’s defense accused Assistant State Attorney Kristine Bradley, the former prosecutor in the case, of covering up Boutros’s report about Moretti allegedly asking BSO Deputy Adam Gorel to lie about being in the room.
Gorel denied the report. Moretti said he was joking.
Earlier this year, after a hung jury in Demons’s trial, the prosecution accused Demons of using his alleged position as a member of the Bloods gang to ask fellow inmate Terrence Mathis, another alleged Bloods member, to help him get a message to Henry to prevent his ex-girlfriend from testifying.
Demons is awaiting a retrial for the murders and Henry is awaiting trial. Their defense wants the cases against them dropped and the prosecution wants to continue with jury selection.
This is a developing story.
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