Rapper Tory Lanez’s alleged prison attacker is man with previous conviction for assault on inmate

By Canadian Press on May 13, 2025.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Authorities said Tuesday that a man who attacked rapper Tory Lanez in a California prison is an inmate serving a life sentence for second-degree murder who was previously convicted for an in-prison assault with a deadly weapon.

Lanez was in fair condition a day after the attack in a housing unit at the California Correctional Institution in Tehachapi, where he’s serving a 10-year sentence for shooting hip-hop star Megan Thee Stallion in the feet, Pedro Calderon Michel, spokesman for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said in an email.

Authorities did not specify how Lanez was attacked, but a message posted on the rapper’s Instagram account Monday evening said Lanez was stabbed 14 times and both his lungs collapsed.

Prison officials identified the alleged attacker as Santino Casio, 42. He has been put in restricted housing pending an investigation by the prison and the Kern County District Attorney’s Office.

Casio has been in the facility since 2004, after he was sentenced to life, with parole possible, for convictions of second-degree murder and first-degree attempted murder. In 2008, he was sentenced to six more years for assault by a prisoner with a deadly weapon, and in 2018 he was sentenced to two more years for possession and manufacture of a deadly weapon by a prisoner.

Andrew Dalton, The Associated Press

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