R. Kelly's attorneys ask Trump to set him free from prison, accuse feds of plotting to kill him
R. Kelly's attorneys on Tuesday asked President Trump to help them get him freed from federal custody, accusing authorities of plotting steal his mail in order to pressure witnesses to testify against him, and later recruited a white supremacist to kill him in prison.
Kelly's attorneys filed an emergency motion on Tuesday in federal court in Chicago, claiming his life is in danger as he serves a 30-year prison sentence for various sex crimes. They also made a plea to President Trump, asking him to free Kelly immediately.
"R. Kelly's life is now threatened, because of his willingness to fight and to expose the very kind of corruption that President Trump has been fighting and standing up to since the day he took that office," Kelly's attorney, Beau Brindley, said at a press conference Tuesday afternoon. "We will ask President Trump to help us."
Last month, President Trump commuted the sentence of notorious Gangster Disciples co-founder Larry Hoover, and has said he might consider pardoning Sean "Diddy" Combs, who is currently on trial on sex trafficking and racketeering charges. In February, he pardoned former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, five years after commuting his sentence on corruption charges.
Brindley said he does not plan to go through the normal clemency process to seek a pardon for Kelly from the president, but wants to ask the president directly.
"We are seeking a conversation with the president, because R. Kelly does not have the time, with his life in danger, to go through the normal channels," Brindley said. "We are seeking talks with the White House. We are seeking talks with everybody who is willing to help us."
The motion claims Kelly's former cellmate at the federal lockup in Chicago conspired with prison officials to steal his mail and turn them over to prosecutors before his trial on child pornography charges, in order to pit Kelly's former girlfriend against him.
Kelly's attorneys also claim he recently received a call from a Bureau of Prison s official who told him he was not safe behind bars, and "should avoid the mess hall" du to the possibility of his food being poisoned.
One fellow inmate at the prison where Kelly is being held in North Carolina, who is a member of the Aryan Brotherhood, claimed federal prison officials transferred him to that prison asked him to kill Kelly, according to the motion filed by Kelly's attorneys.
Kelly's attorneys claim federal authorities told that inmate they would help him avoid a conviction for Kelly's murder by allowing him to escape from prison, as he had once before. Kelly's defense team also claims that inmate told federal authorities he was willing to kill Kelly, but instead told him the truth, and warned him that his life was in danger.
Federal prosecutors moved to have Kelly's filing sealed after his attorneys revealed the name of one of his victims in their motion.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's office in Chicago did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the filing from Kelly's attorneys.
Kelly, 58, was convicted in 2022 in Chicago of child pornography charges, accused of making videos of himself sexually abusing three teenage girls, including his 14-year-old goddaughter.
The same jury acquitted Kelly of seven other charges, including obstruction of justice, accusing him and two associates of rigging his 2008 child pornography trial in Cook County.
Brindley represented Kelly's former manager, Derrel McDavid, during that trial, and is now working for Kelly.
Meantime, a federal jury in New York convicted Kelly of racketeering and sex trafficking charges in 2021, finding him guilty of running a criminal enterprise to sexually exploit young women and children.
Federal appeals courts have upheld both convictions.
Kelly was sentenced to 30 years in prison in the New York case, and most of his 20-year sentence in the Chicago case is running concurrently to that prison term.
The singer is serving his prison sentence at a medium-security federal correctional center in Butner, North Carolina, and is expected to be released on Dec. 21, 2045, when he would be nearly 79 years old.
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