A 23-year-old rapper was convicted Wednesday of involuntary manslaughter in the deadly shooting of a rival and friend in his Anaheim home.<\/p>\n
Jurors, who began deliberating Monday, found Zachary Pickrell guilty of involuntary manslaughter with a sentencing enhancement for the personal use of a gun. Jurors rejected their other option of second-degree murder.<\/p>\n
Pickrell was scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 30.<\/p>\n
Pickrell shot 17-year-old Danilo Ashton Arauz Jr. of Anaheim on Sept. 5, 2021. Arauz was pronounced dead four days later at a hospital.<\/p>\n
During closing arguments of the trial last week, Pickrell\u2019s attorney, Adam Vining of the Orange County Public Defender\u2019s Office, read jurors a letter of apology from the defendant to the victim\u2019s family that police had persuaded him to write during questioning.<\/p>\n
Before the arguments resumed Monday, Senior Deputy District Attorney Juliet Oliver complained to Orange County Superior Court Judge Patrick Donahue that Vining had improperly injected emotion into his arguments by reading the apology letter.<\/p>\n
As a deputy called jurors back into the courtroom, they applauded, prompting Oliver to say, \u201cIt was funny hearing you applaud because I thought that\u2019s what you were expected to do at the end of Thursday\u2019s argument. Because what the defendant did was a performance. \u2026 But this is not Hollywood, or central casting or a show. This is about a 17-year-old boy murdered at the hands of the defendant.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pickrell and Arauz grew up together and lived near each other. The two were rival rappers, and Pickrell appeared to have been angered by one of Arauz\u2019s songs.<\/p>\n
The dispute appeared to involve the \u201cterritory\u201d the two had claimed in the 1700 and 1800 blocks of Holbrook Lane, where they lived. Pickrell claimed the 1700 block and was angered when Arauz released an album titled \u201cTrappin\u2019 Out of 1800,\u201d Oliver said.<\/p>\n
But shortly before the fatal shooting, the two appeared to have reconciled.<\/p>\n
Pickrell invited Arauz and his friend, Billy Harness, to his house, where they spent time in the defendant\u2019s upstairs studio while his mother, Lori Pickrell, was downstairs, Oliver said.<\/p>\n
The three talked about a song Arauz had released that day titled \u201cSeeing Red\u201d and handled a handgun, according to Oliver. Two videos showing the men handling the gun were introduced as evidence at trial.<\/p>\n
Oliver pointed to an element of second-degree murder law requiring proof of an \u201cact inherently dangerous to human life.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo when (Pickrell) decides to pick up that gun and put it to Ashton\u2019s head and pull the trigger that\u2019s an act inherently dangerous to human life,\u201d Oliver said.<\/p>\n
Oliver also challenged Pickrell\u2019s credibility, noting that he spent hours after the shooting lying to police about what happened. Pickrell initially falsely claimed Arauz had been the victim of a drive-by shooting.<\/p>\n
Harness testified that he saw bullets on a table before the shooting but recalled that there was no bullet in the gun when he held it as it was being passed around, Oliver said.<\/p>\n
The prosecutor said Pickrell \u201cditched the gun\u201d after the shooting and \u201cgot rid of the casing for the bullet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe man who committed murder has tampered with all the evidence at this point,\u201d Oliver argued.<\/p>\n
The prosecutor argued that it did not matter whether Pickrell knew there was a bullet in the gun.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe doesn\u2019t give a hoot if there\u2019s a bullet in the chamber because he\u2019s going to send a message,\u201d Oliver said. \u201cBut if he checked (the gun) we wouldn\u2019t be here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vining argued that prosecutors failed to prove Pickrell knew there was a bullet in the chamber.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was no argument, no dispute, no fight\u201d before the shooting, Vining noted.<\/p>\n
The defense attorney said Pickrell attempted to help Arauz after the shooting.<\/p>\n
Vining also questioned Harness\u2019 credibility, pointing to contradictory statements he had made over the years.<\/p>\n
\u201cHis memory, making things up, is consistent with his desire\u201d to make sense of what happened, Vining said.<\/p>\n
If Harness had believed there was a bullet in the gun, he would have stood up and tried to intervene, Vining argued.<\/p>\n
If Pickrell had intended to kill Arauz, \u201cWhy have him come over to his house? Why did he have such a stupid cover-up?\u201d Vining argued. \u201cWhy didn\u2019t he take a car to run.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the letter, Pickrell wrote to the victim\u2019s family, \u201cI\u2019m extremely sorry for the pain and suffering I\u2019ve put you through. \u2026 I loved your son so much. He was like a brother to me. \u2026 Everything I\u2019ve done was all an accident. I hope your son will be OK and make it. If anything I wish it was me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vining also showed jurors an image of the defendant praying while in custody.<\/p>\n
\u201cNone of these things negate implied malice,\u201d Oliver responded. \u201cHe loved playing with fire and killed someone because of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The prosecutor said the apology letter and prayer were \u201ccontrived.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A 23-year-old rapper was convicted Wednesday of involuntary manslaughter in the deadly shooting of a rival and friend…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":496312,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164,5685,5686,10966,49398],"class_list":["post-496311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-convicted","tag-killing","tag-rapper","tag-rival"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496311","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=496311"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496311\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/496312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=496311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=496311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=496311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}