Chance the Rapper, Meek Mill and 21 Savage are just a few leading rappers who have urged the Supreme Court to hear a fellow artist's First Amendment challenge to his conviction for threatening police officers in a song.
The stars of the hip hop industry are rallying around Pittsburgh rapper Mayhem Mal, real name Jamal Knox, who created a song called 'F**k the Police' in 2012,
Knox along with his friend Soulja Beaz, real name Rashee Beasley, rapped 'let's kill these cops 'cause they don't do us no good' after Knox was arrested on drug and gun charges earlier that year.
The song named two officers who had arrested Knox in the incident and the men were set to testify against Knox at his criminal trial.
Knox, who was 19 at the time, was convicted of witness intimidation and terroristic threats in 2014 and sentenced to two years behind bars.
Now, lawyers for 24-year-old Knox are trying to persuade the Supreme Court to hear his case, citing the First Amendment, and other A-List rappers are backing his fight.
Knox created a song called 'F**k the Police' in 2012, where he rapped 'let's kill these cops 'cause they don't do us no good'. At 19 years old, Knox was convicted of witness intimidation and terroristic threats in 2014 and sentenced to two years behind bars
Rappers including Killer Mike, a Grammy-winning rapper and community activist, Chance the Rapper, Meek Mill, Yo Gotti, Fat Joe, Mad Skillz, 21 Savage, Jasiri X, Styles P, as well as music industry veterans and scholars, all signed their names in a brief filed on Wednesday in support of Knox's case.
'We are optimistic the court will take this important and timely case and ensure that the First Amendment offers the same protections to the artists who create rap music as to other artists', partner Alex Spiro of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan told DailyMail.com.
Speaking to the New York Times on the day of the filing, Killer Mike, real name Michael Santiago Render, compared Knox's case to the controversial 'stop and frisk' policy, saying it was simply 'another form of racial profiling'.
He said: 'Outlaw country music is given much more poetic license than gangster rap, and I listen to both.
'And I can tell you that the lyrics are dark and brutal when Johnny Cash describes shooting a man in Reno just to watch him die and when Ice Cube rapped about a drive-by shooting early in his career.'
Lawyers say the many rappers who are supporting Knox 'seek to put rap which is a heavily stigmatized form of expression associated with negative stereotypes and often subject to misinterpretation, in the context of the history and conventions of the genre.
'The poetic nature of rap lyrics requires analysis of the multilayered meanings attributable to such lyrics, viewed through the lens of the intended audience.'
Now, lawyers for 24-year-old Knox are trying to persuade the Supreme Court to hear his case, citing the First Amendment, and other A-List rappers including Chance the Rapper (left) and 21 Savage (right) are backing his fight
Rappers including Meek Mill (pictured), Killer Mike,Yo Gotti, Fat Joe, Mad Skillz, Jasiri X, Styles P, as well as music industry veterans and scholars, all signed their names in a brief filed on Wednesday in support of Knox's case
