Snoop Dogg Pleads Guilty to Weapons Charge

Snoop Dogg appeared in an Orange County, Calif. courtroom yesterday (September 20) to plead guilty to carrying an illegal police baton after being arrested at John Wayne Airport in July 2006. According to the LA Times, Tha Doggfather was attempting to board a plan to San Francisco last year when authorities found an illegal baton that can extend from 8 to 21 inches. While Snoop claimed the baton was merely a prop used in a prior South African concert, his attorneys, Donald Etra and Al Stokke, did not want their client to plead guilty and advised Snoop to take a plea agreement that includes three years of informal probation and 160 hours of community service. Orange County Judge, Erick L. Larsh, agreed to reduce the felony weapons count to a misdemeanor after a year on the conditions that Snoop didn’t break the law or his probation. In addition, Judge Larsh said Snoop could not work with gangs, children or his nonprofit youth football league in order to fulfill his community service. “The spirit of the community service offer is for him to do the work in a manner in which he isn’t glorified in the eyes of children,” Deputy District Attorney Andre Manssourian said. Snoop, however, wasn’t very receptive of the restrictions. “Why can’t I work with kids and gangs, when that’s what I do?,” Snoop asked the judge, who responded by saying, “There has to be the pound of flesh, so to speak. There has to be pain in the punishment.” After the hearing yesterday, Snoop did not speak to reporters, but his attorney Donald Etra said, “He [Snoop] wants to make music, not court appearances.”