Rapper ASAP Bari avoids jail after he is fined for sexually assaulting woman in Shoreditch hotel
Custody photo of Jabari Shelton AKA ASAP Bari. Pic: Met Police - Credit: Archant
American rapper ASAP Bari has walked free from court after he was just fined for sexually assaulting a woman at a hotel in Shoreditch.
ASAP Bari arrived at the Old Bailey wearing a ski mask. Pic: Kirsty O'Connor/PA Wire - Credit: PA
American rapper ASAP Bari has walked free from court after he was just fined for sexually assaulting a woman at a hotel in Shoreditch.
The 27-year-old hip hop star, real name Jabari Shelton, pleaded guilty today to one count of sexual assault after a video emerged of him attacking a woman at The Curtain Hotel in July 2017.
Footage played at the Old Bailey showed Shelton pull the covers from the naked woman as she lay in bed, before slapping her bottom as she told him to “stop”.
The attack took place after the Wireless Festival music event.
The sexually assault took place at the Curtain Hotel in Shoreditch. Pic: Ken Mears - Credit: Archant
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Shelton was initially arrested last year but bailed in June 2018 after he paid a cash security of £25,000 to allow him to return to the United States, the court heard.
Today he was fined £4,000 and told to pay £2,500 compensation to his victim.
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Prosecuting, James Lofthouse said Shelton first approached his victim as she waited for a taxi after the festival.
Mr Lofthouse said: “He (Shelton) walked up to her and propositioned her, if I can put it that way. She said no.”
The court heard that the woman went to hotel with another man, named in court as AJ.
Mr Lofthouse went on: “She was then woken at around 4.30 or five in the morning, shortly after, by the defendant entering the bedroom.
“He seemed to react to her being present in bed with AJ.
“He pulled the duvet off and Your Honour has seen the footage of what occurred and indeed what was said.”
Shelton can be heard saying sexual obscenities at her.
Mr Lofthouse added: “She then moved hastily towards the bathroom. He slapped her naked buttocks as she did so and she was saying, ‘Honestly, Bari, no stop.”’
Police were later called to the hotel and the woman initially denied she had been assaulted, but she reported Shelton several days later when footage emerged online.
Shelton’s barrister, Gideon Cammerman QC, told the court the footage of the attack was shared online by “somebody who wanted to do him harm’ and his client had already spent seven days in custody after his initial arrest.
He added: “The publicity that this case has attracted has already caused very significant financial loss to him, the loss of very significant contracts and other matters.”
Shelton flew over from his home in Manhattan in New York to attend the trial.