Judge Orders Rapper to Get Some Manners

At a June hearing, a Philadelphia judge became so exasperated at defendant Robert Williams’ seeming cluelessness about his need to keep his probation appointments, she ordered him to take “etiquette” classes before returning to court. Williams, a rap singer and budding music mogul still under court supervision on gun and drug charges from 2008, cavalierly defended his inability to find time for his probation officer by explaining that he was a busy man, working with seven “artists,” with a demanding travel schedule and uninhibitedly using social media (creating posts that, allegedly, led to threats against the probation officer). Williams was accompanied to court by a several-man entourage.