Federal prosecutors returned to Lil Durk’s own words during closing arguments in his murder-for-hire trial, playing just 56 seconds from a nearly three-hour interview with DJ Akademiks and arguing that the brief exchange amounted to an “incredible statement of responsibility” for the deadly 2022 attack at the center of the case.

The clip came from Durk’s 2023 appearance on Akademiks’ “Off The Record” podcast. During the interview, Akademiks brought up the pressure Durk had faced online following the November 2020 killing of his close friend and fellow Chicago rapper King Von.

People on social media had repeatedly told Durk to “slide for Von,” a phrase prosecutors interpreted as calls for retaliation.

Akademiks asked Durk about those comments.

“For some odd reason, I don’t see those comments anymore,” Durk responded.

Prosecutors seized on that sentence during their Sept. 8 rebuttal closing argument, telling jurors that Durk’s remark carried a much darker meaning than it might appear to on its own.

According to the government’s theory, the online demands for Durk to retaliate stopped because the August 2022 attack targeting rapper Quando Rondo had already occurred.

Prosecutors described the interview remark as an “incredible statement of responsibility” and a “brazen confession.”

Durk’s defense strongly disputed that interpretation.

Prosecutors Point to Akademiks’ Reaction

The government didn't focus exclusively on Durk’s words.

Prosecutors also highlighted Akademiks’ reaction immediately following the answer, pointing to the pause and expression from the media personality as support for their argument that Durk’s meaning was understood in the moment.

That interpretation subsequently drew pushback from Akademiks himself, who publicly disputed the significance prosecutors attached to his reaction.

Durk’s attorneys similarly argued that the government had taken a tiny portion of a much longer conversation and presented it without context.

The disputed clip lasted approximately 56 seconds. The full interview ran nearly three hours.

Defense Says the Clip Was Taken Out of Context

Durk’s legal team had previously sought to introduce additional portions of the interview that it believed would give jurors a different understanding of the conversation.

Those portions included Durk discussing Tekashi 6ix9ine’s comments about “sliding for Von” and indicating that he did not take the trolling seriously. The defense also pointed to portions in which Durk discussed walking away from conflict and turning “hate into love.”

After prosecutors emphasized the 56-second clip during closing arguments, Durk’s attorneys filed an emergency request seeking to reopen the evidence so jurors could hear additional portions of the interview or receive further instruction.

The defense described the government’s presentation as misleading and argued that the additional footage was necessary to provide context.

U.S. District Judge Michael Fitzgerald ultimately denied the request. The judge noted that the prosecution’s characterization of the clip occurred during closing arguments, and arguments made by attorneys are not themselves evidence.

That distinction is important.

Durk never explicitly said in the interview that he ordered the August 2022 shooting, and the phrase “incredible statement of responsibility” represented the prosecution’s interpretation of his remark rather than a direct confession by Durk.

The Government’s Theory

The federal case centers on the August 2022 shooting in Los Angeles that prosecutors alleged was intended to kill rapper Quando Rondo, whose legal name is Tyquian Bowman.

Bowman survived, but his cousin Saviay’a “Lul Pab” Robinson was killed.

Prosecutors alleged the attack was retaliation for the November 2020 killing of King Von, who died following a confrontation involving members of Bowman’s entourage in Atlanta. Durk pleaded not guilty and denied orchestrating the murder-for-hire plot.

Throughout the trial, prosecutors attempted to connect Durk to the alleged plot through cooperating witnesses, communications, travel arrangements, social-media material and statements he made publicly.

The Akademiks interview became particularly significant because it allowed prosecutors to argue directly from Durk’s own words.

But the defense maintained that those words were being stripped of the broader conversation surrounding them.

Fifty-Six Seconds From a Three-Hour Conversation

That dispute left jurors with two sharply different interpretations of the same moment.

To prosecutors, Durk’s observation that he no longer saw people telling him to “slide for Von” was significant because it came after the August 2022 shooting and could be understood, under their theory, as an acknowledgment that retaliation had occurred.

To Durk’s defense, the government had selected less than a minute from a nearly three-hour podcast and assigned a criminal meaning to a statement that made more sense when viewed alongside the rest of the conversation.

The jury was left to decide what weight, if any, to give the exchange.

As closing arguments concluded, Durk maintained his not-guilty plea, and the prosecution’s description of the podcast clip remained an argument about what his words meant—not an explicit admission from Durk himself.