Mystikal Pleads Not Guilty To Rape And Battery Charges
Mystikal, whose real name is Michael Tyler, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree rape, strangulation, simple criminal damage to property, false imprisonment, simple robbery, possession of heroin, marijuana, methamphetamine, and Xanax, and possession of drug paraphernalia, according to the Associated Press. His attorney Joel Pearce says he’s “innocent” on all charges.
BET.com previously reported that Ascension Parish deputies arrested the rapper after they spoke with a sexual assault victim at the local hospital. Deputies shared that he forced the woman to give him money following a dispute over finances, with the woman suffering minor injuries.
“My client doesn’t even do drugs, so he has no idea what they were talking about,” Pearce told the AP in a telephone interview.
Pearce said bond may be discussed at a hearing Oct. 17 with prosecutors planning to bring up the rapper’s 2003 guilty plea to sexual battery and extortion as evidence of prior crimes.
Tyler and two bodyguarded recorded themselves in a sexual act with the rapper’s hairstylist with the woman telling Sue Bernie, the prosecutor in the 2003 case; she was accused of stealing $80,000 worth of checks from the 51-year-old, alleging the musician told her she would have to do something “degrading” if she didn’t want him to go to the police.
While Pearce isn’t sure what the woman is now accusing his client of stealing, the criminal damage charge accuses him of breaking the band of her Apple watch.