YG Felony Robbery Case Dismissed in Vegas After Civil Settlement

YG won dismissal of a felony robbery case in Las Vegas on Monday after paying a “nuisance settlement” to the man who claimed the rapper stole his chain during a confrontation at the Cosmopolitan Hotel and Casino in 2018, his lawyers confirm.

Prosecutors dumped the case just days before a trial on the robbery and grand larceny charges was set to begin on May 16, defense lawyer Gia Marina tells Rolling Stone. “The victim no longer wanted to pursue the case and didn’t want to travel, so the state dismissed it. He was an out-of-state victim,” she said.

Marina referred questions about the civil settlement to Joe Tacopina, the New York-based lawyer who also repped the rapper, 32, after he was arrested in Los Angeles County in 2020 — just days before he took the stage at the 2020 Grammys for a tribute to Nipsey Hussle — in connection with a different alleged robbery. Charges were never filed in that case.

Tacopina said the alleged victim in the Vegas case was “made whole” through an undisclosed civil settlement even though YG, whose real name is Keenon Jackson, is adamant he did not pocket the chain in the Cosmopolitan case.

“YG didn’t steal his chain,” Tacopina tells Rolling Stone. “This was a nuisance settlement. The man lost his neck chain during a scuffle. This was an out-of-court settlement that is confidential.”

The chain reportedly was valued at between $3,000 and $9,000, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The newspaper previously reported that Jackson was with a group of about 12 people walking through the casino resort when the alleged victim, identified as a fan, asked for a photo but was blocked by the rapper’s entourage. The fan allegedly was besieged by the group after stating Jackson wasn’t “that big of a celebrity anyway,” an arrest warrant obtained by the newspaper said.

The fan reportedly told police that Jackson personally ripped the chain off of his neck. Security footage reviewed by Las Vegas police also purportedly showed Jackson walking away from the man “with a a shiny object” in his hand, Metropolitan Police Department spokesman Jay Rivera told the Review-Journal.

Clark County District Attorney Steven Wolfson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Monday dismissal.