Lil Durk’s trial on federal racketeering charges has been pushed back to August 30, 2027, nearly two years after the Chicago rapper’s arrest and less than three weeks after a jury cleared him in a separate murder for hire case.
U.S. District Judge Michael W. Fitzgerald moved the start of the Lil Durk trial from October 5 of this year to August 30, 2027, at 8:30 a.m. The delay came at the request of Durk’s own legal team, who told the court they needed the extra time for “effective preparation” of the case. Lawyers for his co-defendants DeAndre “OTF DeDe” Wilson and David “Browneyez” Lindsey joined the request. Fitzgerald agreed the defense needed more time to investigate and properly represent their clients. A fourth co-defendant, Asa Houston, is also set to stand trial with them.
The second case centers on a VICAR charge, short for violent crimes in aid of racketeering. Racketeering laws let federal prosecutors go after people they accuse of running a criminal organization, and a VICAR charge accuses someone of committing or ordering violence to benefit that organization. Prosecutors say Durk helped finance and organize a killing to benefit what they call a criminal enterprise. Durk has pleaded not guilty. The charge appears in the government’s fourth superseding indictment, meaning prosecutors have now rewritten and replaced their charges against him four times.
Before the trial, Durk will get a chance to fight for his freedom. Fitzgerald has scheduled a bond hearing for November 4, where Durk’s lawyers will ask the court to let him out of jail while the case moves forward. Durk has been in federal custody since his arrest in October 2024. If he is denied bond, he could spend close to another year behind bars before this Lil Durk trial even begins.
The delay follows a major win for the rapper. On September 11, a jury found Durk not guilty on all five counts in his murder for hire trial over the August 2022 shooting in Los Angeles that killed Saviay’a “Lul Pab” Robinson, the cousin of rapper Quando Rondo. Prosecutors had accused Durk of ordering the hit on Quando Rondo. Wilson and Lindsey were acquitted of murder for hire but convicted of stalking and stalking conspiracy, and both are appealing.
The racketeering charges were split off from that first case and handled separately. Durk’s attorneys plan to file motions asking the court to throw out the second case entirely, arguing that he has already been acquitted of much of what prosecutors would try to prove at the second Lil Durk trial. His attorney Drew Findling called for Durk to be freed right after the September verdict.
