According to court documents reportedly obtained by XXL on Friday (May 31), Lil Zay Osama and his legal team entered a guilty plea in his federal firearm case on Thursday. For those unaware, this case has been in limbo since September of 2022, after an Uber driver found a Glock with a switch in his car after the Chicago rapper took a ride. He pleaded guilty in Brooklyn Federal Court and still hasn't received a sentencing date, but could face a ten-year maximum or likely a 21 or 27-month sentence given federal guidelines. "I knowingly possessed a firearm that was a machine gun in Queens County on Sept. 29, 2022," Zay reportedly expressed in court according to the New York Daily News. I know that it was wrong and against the law.
Furthermore, this whole incident came about when an Uber driver picked Lil Zay Osama and his colleagues up in Manhattan. He saw him holding a gun and then dropped them off in Queens, and it was after their exit that the driver found a modified Glock 22 .40 caliber with an "auto sear" device that Zay left behind. After the driver notified the cops, they arrested him. But the case took an odd turn later in November, as authorities dismissed the case.
Lil Zay Osama's Guilty Plea
However, things didn't look bright for Lil Zay Osama for long, as in December of 2023, police arrested him on a weapons possession charge and alleged robbery. Then, in January, he received an indictment from a grand federal jury, which included charges of machine gun possession and possession of an unregistered firearm. "I guarantee n***as gone need me before I need them," Zay seemed to respond to these charges on social media. "I’ll be home sooner than you think. Blink n***a [purple devil emoji]."
Meanwhile, now all that's left for him is to wait for his sentence and hope for the best. We hope that this is Lil Zay Osama's last legal obstacle on the way, and that he's able to not just grow from these experiences but turn them into something positive. It may seem small or flat-out warranted to the average reader, but the constance of these circumstances and the places they come from require a much more nuanced conversation. Here's hoping this gets him closer to that discussion in his personal life and beyond.