(Photo: New York Law Enforcement)

Federal prosecutors will no longer seek the death penalty against Lil Kim's ex-boyfriend Damion "World" Hardy as ordered by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. According to the New York Daily News the decision was announced in court Thursday (May 29) without explanation.

Hardy, 39, was arrested in 2004 in connection with six murders dating back more than a decade ago. The former leader of the Cash Money Brothers, a Brooklyn-based drug collective, allegedly ordered a quartet of murders in retaliation for the death of his brother, Ivory "Peanut" Davis. He's also accused of participating in the murder of Swedish director Jhoan Camitz, who was an innocent bystander that witnessed the Davis hit, and in the slaying of an employee that kicked him out of a Brooklyn roller-skating rink.

Kim and Hardy were reportedly engaged at one point, and lived together in the rapper's New Jersey mansion up until he had a mental breakdown in 2004. That year, Hardy took a pilgrimage to the Middle East, changed his name to Isa Ibn Jibril, and believed himself to be a Messiah. 

Prosecutors claim that since 2006 Hardy has been a menace behind bars doing everything from attacking guards to stabbing an inmate and filling a tube of toothpaste with urine and feces. For the last few years Hardy has been locked away in a Missouri hospital where he has been forcibly medicated with anti-psychotic drugs in attempts to make him mentally competent to stand trial.

Attending Thursday's court appearance via video conference, Hardy begged to be taken off the drugs, telling Federal Judge Frederic Block, "I wasn't supposed to be medicated this long. if you don't clarify it, I'll keep getting medicated!"

Despite his plea, Assistant U.S. Attorney James Loonam said in court that Hardy has so far "responded well" to the drug treatment.

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