Murder

R v S

Narita was instructed to defend in a Murder trial where the prosecution sought to rely upon a Drill Rap which they alleged amounted to a factually accurate account of events which occurred before and after a fatal stabbing.

The prosecution sought to rely upon an expert to controversially interpret the drill rap. Post Narita’s cross-examination it transpired that the expertise of the prosecution expert was limited to linguistic interpretation of urban slang. The defence identified and instructed an expert who specialised in policing and criminalisation of black music subcultures, the rap on trial project and in particular grime and drill music. It became clear, post challenge, that drill lyrics can be fact, fiction or a combination of both. However, it would be unsafe to rely upon the lyrics as factually accurate.

Drill rap has a growing appeal with millions of YouTube hits. Its criminalisation is a highly topical issue, such as the case of Digga D.

Narita’s team understood the provenance and background to rap and were able to mount a proper legal challenge to the material, to ensure that it is not given adverse weight.