2 men convicted in 2002 killing of hip-hop icon Jam Master Jay

Feb. 27 (UPI) -- Two men on trial for the 2002 killing of hip-hop icon Jason Mizell, known by the stage name Jam Master Jay, were convicted of murder Tuesday, according to the Justice Department.

Karl Jordan Jr. and Ronald Washington were indicted by a grand jury in 2020 for what prosecutors described as a "drug-related homicide."

"Today, a federal jury in Brooklyn returned a guilty verdict against Karl Jordan Jr. and Ronald Washington," the Justice Department said in a press release Tuesday. "Both defendants were charged with murder while engaged in a narcotics trafficking conspiracy and firearm-related murder for the fatal shooing of Mizell inside the victim's recording studio."

Mizell, who co-founded Run-DMC in the early 1980s with Joseph "Rev Run' Simmons and Darryl "D.M.C" McDaniels, was shot dead in his Queen, N.Y., recording studio in October 2002.

According to prosecutors, Mizell became involved drug trafficking during the 1990s and had obtained 22 lbs. of cocaine as part of an intended deal with Jordan and Washington.

According to prosecutors, Washington planned to murder Mizell when he was cut out of the planned deal.

"We allege that Jordan and Washington walked into the music studio in Queens and shot in cold blood," U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York told a press conference in 2020.

"A cold case is never a forgotten case," said NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban.

"Mr. Mizell's loved ones -- who long-expected and deserved justice to be delivered were patient, too, and we hope the jury's decisions today advance a small measure of closure," Caban continued.