By FRED SHUSTER
Pop star Rihanna returned to a downtown Los Angeles courtroom Thursday and watched the alleged victim in the assault trial of her boyfriend A$AP Rocky become increasingly contentious on the witness stand under questioning by the rapper-turned-fashion designer’s attorney.
Terell Ephron, 36, formerly known as A$AP Relli, contends that Rocky, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, attacked him on a Hollywood street four years ago, pulled a gun and fired twice, causing minor injuries to his hand.
Mayers’ attorney, Joe Tacopina, maintains the weapon was a prop gun from a music video that was incapable of firing real ammunition. The gun does not now exist, attorneys said. Ephron insists he found two shell casings on the street at the scene of the altercation hours after police searched the street.
The exasperation level ran high in the courtroom as Tacopina’s questions on cross examination about Ephron’s bank accounts and Instagram postings around the time of the November 2021 altercation caused Ephron to turn prickly and seemingly writhe on the stand, shaking his head, flexing his neck muscles and scowling at his interrogator. The judge stopped to admonish the trial’s key witness several times, ordering him to simply respond to yes-or-no questions with one word and avoid long explanations.
But Ephron frequently answered Tacopina with long, defensive answers, and several times demanded the defense attorney explain what he was getting at.
“I don’t understand these questions,” Ephron said. “Why am I answering questions about my Instagram?”
Tacopina: “Here’s what we’re gonna do: I ask the questions, you answer them.”
At another juncture, Ephron blamed the attorney for suggesting he was trying to extort Mayers. But the judge had previously forbidden defense attorneys from accusing the witness of just that.
In front of the jury, the increasingly angry Ephron snapped, “People are calling me an extortionist…”
Superior Court Judge Mark Allen tried to calm the situation: “No one is calling you an extortionist. … Nobody is here to disrespect you, nobody is here to insult you.”
The judge also has been forced to deal with continued sniping between Tacopina and Deputy District Attorney John Lewin, who have engaged in an aggressive war of words in which they talk over each other and disregard the judge’s command to stop arguing and cease “speaking objections.”
In his opening statement last week, Tacopina accused Ephron of being driven by “jealousy, lies and greed,” and alleged that he invented parts of his allegations to bolster an attempt to siphon cash from Mayers.
In court Thursday, Tacopina asked about Ephron’s finances in 2021, suggesting he was then running out of money.
Mayers’ trial opened Jan. 24 after the rapper rejected a plea deal that would have required him to plead guilty to one of two felony charges of assault with a semiautomatic firearm and serve six months behind bars.
If convicted at trial of both counts as charged, he would face up to 24 years in prison, according to prosecutors.
Former talent manager Ephron testified under questioning by the prosecution previously that since it became public that he had gone to police about the November 2021 shooting, and charges were brought against Mayers, his career in hip-hop management was “done.”
“People labeled me a snitch,” Ephron said. “As far as social media, I don’t have a presence anymore. The artists I was working with all turned on me because of the decisions I made … going to the police.”
He said he no longer works with anyone with whom he once did business.
“All my artists turned on me, my A$AP friends turned on me” when the case came to light, Ephron testified.
Wearing a white top with a skinny black tie and gold hoop earrings, Rihanna sat in the gallery between her boyfriend’s mother and sister. It was not immediately known if the star would return to court for a third time Friday.
Ephron alleges he was grabbed by Mayers on the night of Nov. 6, 2021, on a Hollywood street and shot at twice by the rapper, with a bullet grazing the knuckles of his left hand. He testified that after the first shot, he grabbed Illijah Ulanga, known as A$AP Illz, a member of Mayers’ A$AP Mob rap collective who was also at the scene, and used him as a shield.
Asked by a prosecutor if he believed the weapon was a real gun or a prop pistol, Ephron replied, “It was a real gun. I was hit.”
After Mayers and friends ran away, Ephron said he met up with his girlfriend and around 11 p.m. returned to the scene of the altercation — which had already been searched by seven police officers, according to previous testimony. Ephron told jurors he discovered two shell casings on the street.
“So happens, I find (shell casings),” Ephron testified, adding that he took a picture of the cartridge casings where he found them and placed the casings in a paper bag.
The witness said the public didn’t know he was involved in the incident until another member of the A$AP rap crew posted that Ephron was a “snitch” who told police that Mayers had fired a gun at him.
Ephron filed a civil lawsuit for assault, battery and emotional distress against Mayers in August 2022.
A$AP Rocky was arrested in April 2022 upon returning to Los Angeles from a trip with Rihanna to her native Barbados. The couple have two children together.
Before Ephron was called to the stand for the first time Tuesday, Los Angeles Police Department Sgt. Thomas Zizzo Jr. — son of Erika Jayne, former star of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” — testified that seven police officers used flashlights to search the scene for evidence hours after the reported shooting but came away empty-handed.