News and Commentary

‘Insane’: Dave Chappelle’s Attorney Slams Soros-Backed Prosecutor For Not Charging Alleged Attacker With Felony

   DailyWire.com
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA - MARCH 25: Dave Chappelle performs to a sold out crowd onstage at the Hollywood Palladium on March 25, 2016 in Los Angeles, California.
Lester Cohen / WireImage

Dave Chappelle’s lawyer recently told the press this past weekend that it is “insane” that the 23-year-old alleged assailant who attacked his client would likely only receive a slap on the wrist thanks to Los Angeles County’s prosecutor referring the case to the L.A. City Attorney’s Office. Chappelle, according to his attorney, wants the accused suspect to be charged with a felony.

On Thursday, The Daily Wire reported that Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón would not be seeking felony charges for the man accused of attacking Chappelle last Tuesday night because, according to sources, the suspect did not assault Chappelle while using a deadly weapon, despite having one in his luggage. Chappelle’s attorney Gabriel Colwell slammed that decision in several press interviews after Gascon’s office announced the decision.

“It’s a travesty of justice that Gascón is refusing to prosecute this case as a felony,” Colwell told the New York Post. “The city attorney, who filed the case, is doing his job but DA Gascón should also do his job and charge this as a felony.”

On Monday, The Daily Wire reported that thousands of Los Angeles residents also feel that Gascón should do his job — or more to the point, that he shouldn’t be in the job in the first place. A group known as “Recall DA George Gascón” announced last week that it had collected over 400,000 signatures as of May 1 and has raised more than $6 million to advance the movement to oust Gascón from office.

The Daily Wire also noted that in order to get the recall question on the ballot, the campaign must collect 566,857 signatures from registered voters in Los Angeles County. This amounts to approximately 10% of registered voters, as county officials logged 5,690,406 total registrations for September’s gubernatorial recall election.

During the 2020 election, groups backing Gascón’s candidacy received millions of dollars from billionaire George Soros. Since taking office, the progressive prosecutor has been repeatedly criticized for what critics say is a soft-on-crime approach advocated by leftist district attorneys across the country.

Last week, Fox News reported that since Gascón took office in 2020, “Los Angeles has seen a 34% increase in homicide, 15.5% increase in violent crimes, 6.7% increase in property crimes and 67% increase in shooting victims. Arrests have decreased by nearly 25% since 2020, according to LAPD statistics.”

Now, Chappelle’s attacker, Isaiah Lee, will be added to those statistics. Despite having a knife hidden inside a gun, Lee was not charged because sources say he did not actually wield the weapon in his attack on Chappelle.

That reasoning apparently isn’t sitting well with Chappelle.

“This is what Mr. Chappelle wants. Mr. Chappelle wants this case charged as a felony. … Ten thousand people saw Dave Chappelle assaulted on stage at the Hollywood Bowl last Tuesday night, and the assailant had a deadly weapon on him,” Colwell told Rolling Stone magazine. “The fact that this isn’t charged as a felony case by the DA is insane.”

A spokesperson for Recall Gascón emphasized to The Daily Wire that the county’s DA has created an atmosphere that enables and encourages crime every day.

“Perhaps worse than any one specific policy, Gascón has sent a loud and clear message to criminals that he will always have their backs, whether that means lowering sentences or declining to prosecute certain crimes altogether,” the spokesperson said.

“That mentality has turned the streets of Los Angeles into a living nightmare — criminals feel emboldened, residents feel unsafe, and victims feel completely betrayed,” the spokesperson added. “That is why you see convicted killers saying they are going to tattoo Gascón name on their forehead or toasting Gascón with homemade alcohol from inside a prison cell.”

Got a tip worth investigating?

Your information could be the missing piece to an important story. Submit your tip today and make a difference.

Submit Tip
The Daily Wire   >  Read   >  ‘Insane’: Dave Chappelle’s Attorney Slams Soros-Backed Prosecutor For Not Charging Alleged Attacker With Felony