ATLANTA — More than a year ago, Atlanta rapper Young Thug was arrested as part of a sprawling, 80-page racketeering (RICO) indictment alleging he was the leader of the violent Young Slime Life street gang.
More than a year later, no jury has yet been selected in that case, no arguments yet made in trial, and no testimony from witnesses heard.
The case lingered for several months in pretrial as various motions were submitted, argued and ruled upon. Since January, it has been mired in a drawn-out jury selection process.
Another high-profile RICO case could be on the horizon in Atlanta, and its star defendant could be Donald Trump.
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As a Fulton County jury is expected to make charging decisions in the coming weeks, there is much speculation that the former president and his allies could be charged under Georgia's RICO statutes for their efforts to overturn the state's 2020 election.
If that complex prosecution is pursued against the former president and friends, one thing can be drawn from the ongoing YSL case: "Don't expect things to move quickly."
Melissa Redmon, a University of Georgia law professor and former longtime prosecutor in the Fulton DA's Office, told 11Alive the specifics of the YSL case and a potential Trump case are far too different to draw close parallels.
One involves accusations of murder, theft and street crime. The other is a "white collar" case focused on alleged political fraud and manipulation.
But they both have to start somewhere once. And if a RICO indictment is returned, there are many ways for things to get bogged down.
"I think there's so much going on behind the scenes that we have no idea (about)," Redmon said.
She told 11Alive she expects many pretrial motions, as Trump's legal team would want to keep things on ice for as long as possible.
"You have the election cycle coming up so their motivation would be to not have to deal with this until later on, so I think it would be more pretrial motions, appeals of however those motions - whichever way the judge rules on those motions - so that would lend to a delay before you even get to jury selection," she said.
And what would that all look like?
"You'll see the pretrial motions to dismiss, and attorneys stating why the case should be dismissed, so those should be the initial motions and then if the case survives, then motions on what type of evidence is admissible or should be excluded, so then those get litigated," she said. "All that would happen before you actually get to scheduling when the trial would occur."
That would differ from the YSL case, which has been bogged down more by jury selection process.
Because the YSL trial is expected to go so long and because it involves more violent crimes, there have been more avenues for people to claim hardship or claim they fear retribution than there would likely be with a theoretical Trump RICO jury selection, Redmon said.
Redmon added there would almost certainly be entirely different teams within the DA's Office working the YSL and Trump cases.
One similarity that would arise is in how prosecution teams and lead litigators need to approach a jury and explain RICO.
It would need to be explained "in a way the jury can clearly understand, how the acts are connected to what the state ultimately has to prove," Redmon said.
"Seeing how potential jurors are receptive to the case as a RICO case and how to explain to a layperson what the case is about, how it comes together," she said, adding: "Breaking it down in lay terms - this group of people for a common purpose, and the way they did it."
DA Willis is well-known in part for her experience with RICO cases, so such a prosecution is possible.
You'll just have to buckle up for a long one.