Attorneys for the white supremacist gunman who killed 10 Black people at a Buffalo supermarket told a judge Thursday that the federal charges against him should be dropped because there weren’t enough Black people and other minority groups on the grand jury that indicted him.

Payton Gendron did not attend the hearing, during which his lawyers argued that his constitutional rights to a grand jury drawn from a cross section of the community were violated.

At the hearing’s start, U.S. District Judge Lawrence Vilardo noted Gendron’s objection to the prevalence of white people on the panel seemed “a little incongruous” in the hate crimes case. He did not immediately rule on the motion.

Gendron could face the death penalty if convicted in the 2022 mass shooting at a Tops supermarket, which he targeted because of its location in a primarily Black neighborhood. Those killed ranged in age from 32 to 86. Three others were wounded.

Gendron already is serving a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole after pleading guilty in November 2022 to multiple state charges, including murder.

A trial on the pending federal hate crime and weapons counts is expected to begin next year. The Justice Department said it would seek the death penalty if Gendron is found guilty.

Attorney John Elmore, who represents some of the victims’ relatives in lawsuits, said Gendron’s lawyers are doing what they can to keep him alive. He said challenges to the makeup of juries rarely succeed, even though he regularly sees juries lacking minorities.

“It is very ironic that attention to this problem is being brought out in this case, where Payton Gendron committed a racially motivated homicide,” he said by phone after the hearing. “But this has been a persistent problem in our courts that needs to be addressed.”

Gendron’s lawyers argued in a court filing that Black and Hispanic people and men are “systemically and significantly underrepresented” in the lists from which jurors are selected in the Buffalo area.

“To illustrate this point, the grand jury that indicted Payton Gendron was drawn from a pool from which approximately one third of the Black persons expected and one third of the Hispanic/Latino persons expected,” Gendron’s lawyers wrote. Exacerbating the problem, they said, was that the data sources used by a vendor to pull the lists together weren’t preserved.

“We don’t know what the vendor did,” Assistant Public Defender Sonya Zoghlin said. “More importantly, the vendor doesn’t know what he did.”

Statistically, the addition of two more Black people on the 60-person grand jury panel would have balanced the panel, Vilardo said.

“Can’t that be the result of an accident,” the judge asked, rather than systemic exclusion?

In opposing the motion, Assistant U.S. Attorney Caitlin Higgins said that at worst, the issue constitutes a “technical violation,” not grounds to dismiss the indictment.

The federal law governing jury selection “doesn’t entitle the defendant to a perfect representation,” she said.

Zoghlin said the issue was larger than the panel that ultimately heard Gendron’s case and included the exclusion of certain groups from the selection process, including inactive voters.

In a written filing, the U.S. Attorney’s office said Gendron didn’t prove a systematic underrepresentation that was caused by the district’s jury plan. Any disparities in the racial makeup were within accepted guidance, they wrote, and not caused by the selection process, which draws from voter, driver, tax, disability and unemployment rolls.

Higgins said courts have routinely rejected similar challenges: Vilardo said he was unaware that any such motions had been granted in cases with similar disparities in New York state’s federal courts.

Gendron’s attorneys, in an earlier filing, argued that Gendron should be exempt from the death penalty because he was 18 years old at the time of the shooting, an age when the brain is still developing. That motion is pending.

19

The drama over Gabriella Zuniga’s star lawsuit against Shannon Sharpe has just hit an unexpected turn. Barely days since it was reported that the retired OnlyFans creator settled her multi-million-dollar suit with the NFL Hall of Famer, Zuniga posted on social media a mysterious Bible verse that left the internet reacting.

The Verse That Sparked Debate

In the Instagram Story, Zuniga revealed a line of text from scripture but blocked other portions tactfully with her hand. The portion she revealed was the following:

“I pulverize them like dust of the earth;
I crush them and trample them like mud in the streets.
You have freed me from the feuds among my people;
you have preserved me as head of nations; a people I had not known serve me.
Foreigners submit to me cringing; as soon as they hear, they obey me.
Foreigners lose heart and come trembling from their fortifications.
The LORD lives, blessed be my rock! God, the rock of my salvation, is exalted.
God, he grants me vengeance and casts down peoples under me.
He frees me from my enemies. You exalt me above my adversaries; you rescue me from violent men.”

The verse, filled with imagery of triumph, redemption, and divine retribution, immediately had tongues a-wagging about whether Zuniga was talking about her courtroom battle with Sharpe.

Social Media Reaction

Reaction was swift and split. Some saw the post as one of self-vindication, while others were condemning Zuniga for hypocrisy. The responses ranged from sarcastic to openly toxic:

• “This completes the finesse list.”






• “Hoes love running to the Bible after they did some foul shit like it’s gone save them.”






• “This is disgusting btw.”






• “Final form of a whore.”






• “Hoes always convert to religion.”

The hyperbolic responses both caricatured and underscored how the case has become a test case for arguments about morality, public rehabilitation, and performances of spontaneous religious conversion in the face of scandal.

From Lawsuit to Settlement

The scandal started in April 2025, when a woman called Jane Doe sued Sharpe for sexual assault for $50 million. The lawyers for Sharpe, Lanny J. Davis & Associates, later uncovered the accuser as Gabriella Zuniga, an OnlyFans adult content creator with millions of followers.

Sharpe, host of Club Shay Shay, dismissed all of the allegations as “a blatant and cynical attempt to shake down Mr. Sharpe for millions of dollars” and characterized the claims as “lies, distortions, and misrepresentations.”.

Last month, Zuniga’s attorney, Tony Buzbee, announced that “a mutually agreed upon resolution” had been reached by both parties, and that the case was “closed” with the lawsuit being dismissed with prejudice. While the settlement figure was not released, several outlets have reported it to be in the multi-million-dollar range.

Exit from OnlyFans

Prior to news of settlement, Zuniga announced her retirement from OnlyFans through a since-deleted Instagram post:

“Today, I have decided to retire from OF. Thank you for the incredible support you’ve shown me over the past few years. This community has given me a life I could have never imagined… I’m truly excited for this next chapter. I love you all forever and ever.”

Her departure from the adult site, along with the religiously inspired post, has generated rumors that she is attempting a public rebranding after her court battle.

Related

Kid Cudi has a new memoir out and he is getting quite a lot off his chest. 

During a recent interview with CBS Mornings, the 41-year-old rapper did not hold back as he promoted “Cudi: The Memoir,” revealing raw truths about his career, personal struggles, and his feelings toward a handful of his contemporaries. 

When asked about Drake, he revisited their long-running tension, which had more or less cooled off by 2021. Before they squashed their beef, he recalled how it began when the Toronto rapper dissed him while he was in rehab.

“I was like, oh okay, you wanna kick me when I’m down. Great.” said the “Pursuit of Happiness” rapper. 

Eventually, Kanye West was able to arrange a meeting between the two artists to settle their differences. This resulted in Cudi jumping on a “Certified Lover Boy” track, however, Cudi noted that was the last time since he’s heard from the “Nokia” performer. 

“It just let me know that time is over,” he said. “We’ll never be homies like we were before. I don’t have any beef with him anymore, and I’m not mad at him or anything. It’s just time has gone by. [We are in] different places. It’s all good. I know he loves me. I know that. And I know he respects me as an artist. That’s good enough for me.”

Speaking of Ye, Cudi also publicly declared that he is “done” with the former collaborator and, at one point, close friend.

“He’s said some things that there’s just no coming back from,” Cudi said, adding that the Kanye’s comments about the late fashion designer Virgil Abloh were some of “the most evil, vile, disturbing, f— up” things he’s ever heard. 

“There’s no coming back from that, man. I’m done with you,” he continued. “And it breaks my heart because I loved Kanye. I really loved him. He was part of my life changing, and at some point, he was a really good friend, but the man that he has become, I just don’t know that guy anymore. I don’t know him. I don’t know that version of him and it’s really heartbreaking.”

On another note, he opened up about how much he “hated” testifying during the Sean “Diddy” Combs trial, but said he did it to support Cassie Ventura. 

“I know I did the right thing,” he said. 

Born Scott Mescudi, Kid Cudi grew up in Cleveland with little means but plenty of love. His memoir traces his rise from those humble beginnings to becoming one of the most influential voices in hip-hop, chronicling the whirlwind of sudden fame, drug abuse, a relapse that ended in a stroke, and his eventual path toward sobriety. It’s a candid account of both triumph and turbulence, offering fans an unflinching look at the man behind the music.

In the CBS interview, Cudi said he delves into his rock bottom moments and more.  

“I was running to the grave,” he admitted. “I had a death wish.”

“Cudi: The Memoir” is available now wherever books are sold, and his 11th studio album “Free” is expected later this month.