AC/DC’s Phil Rudd’s Murder for Hire Charge Dropped

Good news for AC/DC's Phil Rudd: The charge that he hired a hitman to kill two people has been withdrawn.

The New Zealand Herald reports that the charge was dropped due to "insufficient evidence."

"I was advised by the Crown Solicitor Hollister-Jones that he had reviewed the police file and the available evidence to support the charge of attempting to procure murder," the rocker's lawyer, Paul Mabey, said in a statement. "He had formed the view that there was insufficient evidence to justify that charge. He has now withdrawn the charge."

Though the murder for hire charge has been withdrawn, Rudd's charges of possession of methamphetamine and cannabis still stand.

Mabey continued to argue on his client's behalf, stating that the charge "should never have been laid" and that Rudd "suffered unnecessary and extremely damaging publicity as a result of widespread and sensational reporting of a very serious allegation, which, on any basis, was never justified."

For his part, the alleged hit man told the New Zealand Herald that the murder for hire charge was "hot air" and that it was "good" that the charge was dropped.