LOS ANGELES (AP) — Rapper Tory Lanez is suing the California prison system, saying he should never have been locked up with the inmate who stabbed him 16 times last year.
Lanez, 33, whose legal name is Daystar Peterson, filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday seeking $100 million against the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and the warden and guards at the Tehachapi prison where he is being held.
The lawsuit alleges that inmate Santino Cascio used a homemade “pocket knife” and was stabbed 16 times in the back, torso, head and face in an “unprovoked life-threatening attack.” Lanez suffered a collapsed lung and had to be airlifted to a hospital, the report said.
Lanez is currently serving a 10-year sentence for shooting hip-hop star Megan Thee Stallion in the foot in Los Angeles in 2022.
Prison officials said he was attacked on May 12, 2025, by Cascio, who was serving a life sentence for second-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder. Cascio was convicted in 2008 of assault with a deadly weapon on an inmate and in 2018 of manufacturing a deadly weapon.
“The choice to place Casio with Peterson was, or should have been, a known danger,” the lawsuit states. Corrections officers allegedly responded slowly and did not use special measures such as flash bangs or smoke grenades to stop Casio. The agency allegedly placed the men together despite the rapper’s “high-profile celebrity status,” which made him a target.
There is no record of Casio being charged in connection with the attack. Lawyers who previously represented him did not respond to messages seeking comment at the time.
Lanez was transferred to another San Luis Obispo County jail, the California Men’s Prison.
The lawsuit also alleges that the defendants unlawfully seized his songbook, which contained unpublished lyrics that had significant future commercial value, and refused to return it.
In response to a request for comment, Department of Corrections spokesman Ike Dodson said the agency does not comment on pending litigation.
TMZ first reported the lawsuit.
Lanez was convicted in December 2022 of three felonies: assault with a semiautomatic firearm; possession of a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle; and discharge of a firearm with gross negligence.
A California court rejected his appeal in November.
Meghan, whose legal name is Megan Pitt, testified at her trial that Lanez shot her in the back of the foot after they left a party at Kylie Jenner’s home in the Hollywood Hills in July 2020 and yelled at her to dance as she walked away from an SUV they were riding in.
She had surgery to remove bullet fragments from both feet. She didn’t publicly identify Lanez as the shooter until months after the incident.
Lanez, a 32-year-old Canadian, began releasing mixtapes in 2009 and has steadily grown in popularity, subsequently releasing albums on major labels, two of which reached the top ten on the Billboard charts.
