A man convicted of sending his 17-year-old son into a restaurant to rob and kill rapper PnB Rock was sentenced Monday to 31 years to life in prison, the AP reports. Judge Connie Quinones handed down the sentence to Freddie Trone, 42, in Los Angeles County Superior Court. A jury on Aug. 7 found Trone guilty of one count of murder, two counts of robbery and one count of conspiracy to commit robbery. Both sides at Trone's trial agreed that the teen walked into Roscoe's Chicken & Waffles in South Los Angeles in September 2022 and shot the Philadelphia hip-hop star, whose legal name is Rakim Allen, while robbing him of his jewelry as he ate with the mother of his 4-year-old daughter.
The prosecution said he was acting on his father's orders, while the defense said Trone was only an accessory after the fact. Trone's attorney says the judge declined at sentencing to give the reasons why his client was a "major participant" in the crime, as usually occurs. He says there was no evidence that Trone was part of planning a killing, nor evidence he knew his son was armed, and that a gun found with Allen was not sufficiently explained at trial. He also believes the jury violated the judge's instructions by doing its own investigating with the evidence, including slowing down video they were shown in real time. He plans to file a notice of appeal. Trone's now-19-year-old son was also charged with murder but is in the custody of the juvenile system. A judge has found that he is not currently competent to stand trial.
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