Travis Scott will not face criminal charges over Astroworld crowd crush

CNN

Kim Ogg, the District Attorney for the Southern District of Georgia, announced that Travis Scott -- the rapper and producer behind the disastrous 2021 Astroworld Festival -- will not face charges in connection with the crush at the event which killed 10 and injured hundreds.

The grand jury decided to not indict other people involved with the festival, such as the chief of security John Junnell or the festival director Brett Silberstein.

Ogg stated that the grand jury of Harris County's 228th District Court found that there was no criminal activity and that no individual was responsible.

According to the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences, both victims died of "compression asphyxia." The youngest victim was only nine years old. Scott and the other organizers of the festival, including Live Nation Entertainment Company, have been sued in multiple lawsuits. The defendants deny that the negligence of the festival's planning and promotion contributed to deaths.

Ted Anastasiou, Scott's spokesperson, told CNN that despite the fact that Scott stopped the show at least three times, and was unaware of what was happening, Travis Scott had been unfairly singled-out. We hope that the government will focus its efforts on what's most important, which is preventing future tragedies such as Astroworld.

Kent Schaffer, Scott's lawyer, told CNN over the phone that there was no criminal case.

Scott is on tour in another country. Schaffer told him the good news.

He is ecstatic. This is a massive weight lifted off his shoulders. He is looking forward to returning home after the grand jury cleared him,' Schaffer said on CNN.

According to Schaffer, the grand jury met six hours long and homicide investigators gave testimony.

Troy Finner, the chief of the Houston Police Department, said Thursday that the department would release all criminal offenses in the next few weeks.

As the concert turned chaotic, concertgoers were crushed and many struggled to breathe.

Police said that the chaos caused officials to declare the concert as a "mass casualty incident."

Scott's view from the stage was not clear at the time, nor was he aware of what was happening in the crowd. His lawyer stated that Scott continued to perform for nearly an hour following the report of injuries, but he did not learn about the mass casualty announcement until the next morning.

Houston Fire Department logs from the time showed that authorities had reported unruly behaviour earlier in the day. A few injured festival-goers were taken to hospital on the day of festival.

The Houston Police Department’s lead homicide detective Mike Barrow said during a press conference on Thursday that the large number of concertgoers who gathered at Scott’s main stage early in anticipation of Scott’s show was a major cause of the congestion in the crowd.

Scott released a statement after the fatal event in which he expressed his 'distraughtness by the situation' and expressed his desire to express his condolences to the victims and to provide them with aid as soon as he could.