Celebrity
R. Kelly hires Bill Cosby’s lawyer to help overturn sex trafficking conviction
R. Kelly has employed Invoice Cosby’s high-profile lawyer to assist enchantment his racketeering conviction in New York.
Chicago Tribune reported that Jennifer Bonjean, a New York-based lawyer, filed her look within the “I Imagine I Can Fly” singer’s case within the U.S. District Court docket in Brooklyn the place the musician was convicted on intercourse abuse and racketeering expenses final month.
Bonjean instructed the outlet that she plans to steer Kelly’s enchantment and post-conviction motions, that are due on Monday (Nov. 1). Nevertheless, she has requested a two-month extension.
Recall Bonjean spearheaded Cosby’s enchantment of his intercourse crimes conviction in Pennsylvania and helped get the actor launched from jail.
The lawyer instructed the Chicago Tribune that she is “wanting ahead to getting conversant in the document” within the Chicago native’s case, which was pushed by Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) expenses.
“I’m changing into more and more involved with how the federal government is abusing the RICO statute with a purpose to plead across the statute of limitations and basically put folks’s complete lives on trial,” Bonjean mentioned. “It’s changing into a system for the federal government. You have got a proper to defend your self towards particular allegations.”
Kelly was convicted of 1 rely of racketeering, with 14 underlying acts that included sexual exploitation of a kid, bribery, kidnapping and intercourse trafficking expenses final month. He was additionally convicted of eight counts of violations of the Mann Act, a intercourse trafficking legislation that makes it unlawful to maneuver anybody throughout state strains “for any immoral function.”
Kelly’s sentencing is ready for Might 4, 2022, the place he probably faces 10 years to life in jail.
Final week, a Chicago decide set the date for the little one pornography trial that he’s going through in his house state. The disgraced singer being accused of recording his sexual encounters with a number of underage women and bribing doable witnesses with money and items to stay silent about his crimes. He’s set to face trial for these federal intercourse expenses subsequent August.
