R. Kelly requests a new trial or the reversal of federal child pornography convictions from the judge.
R. Kelly requests a new trial or the reversal of federal child pornography convictions from the judge.
R&B artist R. Kelly is asking a judge to either toss out those convictions or allow him a new trial two months after he was found guilty on federal child pornography charges.
On Tuesday, Kelly's attorneys submitted the customary post-conviction petitions, saying that the prosecution had failed to establish its case and had permitted a witness to provide false testimony.
Defense lawyer Jennifer Bonjean argued in the move for a new trial that the prosecution's first witness, clinical psychologist Darrell Turner, "perjured testimony" regarding his hourly rate, and that prosecutors neglected to fix that mistake.
According to the request, Turner claimed to be paid $250 per hour during his testimony concerning grooming and its effects on victims of child sexual abuse, but a contract signed before the trial reveals he was really paid $450 per hour. Additionally, he claimed to have worked on this case for two hours, while the contract actually says he put in 6.5 hours.
In her request, Bonjean stated that "as the record reveals, the government did nothing to amend Turner's evidence or inform the jury that Dr. Turner had not testified truthfully." "In the aforementioned instance, the credibility of the complainants was key to the government's argument. Through the use of "expert testimony" from a witness who intentionally delivered misleading testimony and deceived the jury, the government increased the credibility of the complainants.
According to Bonjean, there is a "reasonable chance" that Turner's evidence influenced the jury's decision to accept the testimony of "Nia" and "Pauline," two of the accusers who claimed Kelly had sexually abused them as minors.
In a different motion, Bonjean argued that Kelly's six convictions should be overturned because the prosecution failed to establish "any commercial purpose related to the 'production'" of sex tapes showing Kelly sexually abusing his 14-year-old goddaughter, who was referred to as "Jane" during the trial.
According to Bonjean, "the evidence may have been sufficient to establish criminal sexual abuse violations under the Illinois criminal code, but it did not establish that Defendant: (1) enticed or persuaded Jane to engage in the prohibited conduct; or (2) that he did so with the intention of producing the contraband images." The creation of the visuals was a byproduct of the sexually explicit behaviour; it wasn't the behavior's main goal.
Additionally, according to Bonjean, Kelly "took no acts" to induce any sexual behaviour with "Jane," "Pauline," or "Nia."
In September, a 12-person jury found Kelly guilty of several child pornography-related offences after concluding that in the late 1990s and early 2000s, he sexually assaulted "Jane" and other kids. On charges that they covered up such abuse, however, Kelly and his co-defendants Derrel McDavid and Milton "June" Brown were found not guilty.
Kelly, 55, will be sentenced in February of next year and could spend 10 to 90 years behind bars. After being found guilty in New York of racketeering and sex trafficking, he was previously given a 30-year prison term.
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