R. Kelly has appealed to a judge to dismiss his entire federal criminal case here because the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Illinois as a whole is corrupt, personally biased, and even hearing a jailhouse plot to kill him.
The embattled R&B singer, who is currently serving a 30-year sentence for federal convictions related to child pornography and obstruction of justice, is now waging an aggressive new legal assault. Centers of it is a motion filed by his lawyer, Beau Brindley, asking a federal judge to recuse the Northern District of Illinois from the case.
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Brindley paints a picture of an irredeemably compromised legal team that has allegedly solicited misconduct and engaged in coercion and can no longer be trusted to enforce the law impartially. He contends that at least one former prosecutor was sufficiently involved in inappropriate behavior, and the office's integrity is now in doubt. And if you ask Kelly's legal camp, this was no solo artist operation.
"While it is conceivable in theory that a single rogue AUSA had managed to infect the charging process in Manafort's case, that possibility is very remote and one that demands searching, fair and open inquiry," Brindley wrote in her filing. In doing so, he writes, any prosecutor or supervisor who touched the case has a "personal stake" in defending the result not exactly a recipe for fair justice.
The motion doesn't just accuse officials of misconduct but also asserts that prison staff and prosecutors conspired to undermine Kelly's defense. Brindley claims that legal mail was stolen, confidential documents were turned over to witnesses to "poison" their testimony, and most shocking of all, a convicted Aryan Brotherhood member, Mikeal Glenn Stine, was offered a way home in return for killing Kelly while incarcerated.
Kelly alleges he was overprescribed prescription drugs, refused emergency surgery for blood clots, was dragged out of Duke University Hospital at gunpoint, and plunged into solitary. His lawyers insist this was no accident or misunderstanding and that it was part of a deliberate attempt at his psychological disintegration.
Among the terms in the motion is the name of Assistant U.S. Attorney Jason Julian. Not accused of misconduct himself, Julian led the prosecution and may now be called to testify, a conflict Mr. Kelly's team says mandates his recusal.
(Not even Judge April Perry, who was not involved in the purported misconduct; instead, she recused herself because she had previously worked for Resh & Giulia's office, and that, Kelly's team argues, shows just how incestuous the operation of the players in this case is.
The court has not yet weighed in on the motion. Still, if even part of Kelly's claim is genuine, potential significant changes are coming to one of the most controversial federal cases of recent times.
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