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Drake has been dismissed from the civil lawsuits filed against him, Travis Scott, and many others in the wake of the 2021 Astroworld tragedy, TMZ and Houston’s KPRC 2 reports. Stanton “Larry” Stein, an attorney for Drake, offered no comment when reached by Pitchfork.
The Harris County, Texas, judge overseeing the cases, Kristen Brauchle Hawkins, also dismissed Epic Records, concert promoter ScoreMore, and more entities from the litigation, but did not remove other people and companies that had requested dismissal, including Travis Scott, Apple Inc., and Live Nation Entertainment.
The hundreds of Astroworld-lawsuits were consolidated into one case, and the trial is scheduled to begin in May.
Drake took the stage with Travis Scott during the Houston rapper’s headlining performance at the Astroworld Festival in November 2021. In the days after the event, which left 10 people dead and hundreds more injured, Drake wrote, “My heart is broken for the families and friends of those who lost their lives and for anyone who is suffering. I will continue to pray for all of them, and will be of service in any way I can, May God be with you all.”
Drake sat for a deposition last year in connection with the Astroworld litigation. In March, he formally asked to be dropped from the lawsuits, arguing that he “did not receive any security briefings, was not informed of any crowd control issues, injuries or deaths in the crowd, or any stop show orders at any time either before or during his 14-minute performance.”
The rapper’s attorneys also wrote in their request for dismissal, “Plaintiffs produce no evidence that [Drake] actually knew of any risk in the Festival site design and layout, competence or adequacy of Festival staffing and personnel, or emergency procedures such as show stop authority.”
Last summer, a Harris County grand jury declined to indict Travis Scott in connection with Astroworld.
