R. Kelly Lawyer Jennifer Bonjean Says Appeal Should be on Supreme Court's Radar

TMZ

R. Kelly's attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, came on 'TMZ Live' Tuesday to discuss her client's SCOTUS filing in more depth -- and she made a pretty compelling argument.

Transcript

00:00R. Kelly wants the U.S. Supreme Court to hear his appeal, basically, that says my conviction

00:11in Illinois should be overturned.

00:16And the reason is they charge me for under a law that didn't exist when I committed the

00:22crimes, as they say.

00:23Did this come up during the trial?

00:25Yes.

00:26They raised this issue pretrial, and it was denied.

00:33The government's position is that they admit that they applied a statute of limitations

00:39that did not exist at the time the conduct was allegedly committed.

00:43But they're saying we were permitted to extend it.

00:46It didn't harm him.

00:47It didn't violate what is known as the ex post facto clause.

00:50And our position is not so fast.

00:53The lawmakers, Congress, passed a law that was intended to apply prospectively.

00:58So when they extended the statute of limitations, they didn't say, oh, you can apply it to cases

01:04that existed or the conduct happened before this.

01:07But moving forward, we're going to make it we're going to extend the statute of limitations.

01:12So what we're saying is when they did that, they were not permitted to apply it to conduct

01:18that occurred in the 1990s.

01:20The government has to interpret these statutes as they were intended to be applied.

01:25And they're taking great liberties with it.

01:27And they did so in this case.

01:29The ends justifies the mean types means type of thing.

01:33And I think the US Supreme Court will be really interested because it doesn't this isn't just

01:36an R. Kelly issue.

01:38This is all about do we give the government the power to take liberties with statutes

01:43that were not intended to apply as they're applying them?

01:46The US Supreme Court is under attack in a very big way.

01:51President Biden is going to propose legislation to change the way to change term limits, all

02:00sorts of things.

02:01There are people talking about packing the court.

02:04There are people who want Alito and Thomas removed.

02:07They are under fire right now.

02:09Do you think they that politics will play a part in their decision on whether to hear

02:16the case?

02:17Because if they hear the case, and if they overturn the conviction, there is going to

02:22be a torrent of criticism.

02:25Sure, because it's R. Kelly, right.

02:27But I like the Supreme Court for this issue, frankly, because the Supreme Court seems to

02:32understand that we have a government that's run amok, that we have prosecutors who have

02:39run amok.

02:40They are taking extraordinary liberties with statutes that were never intended by Congress,

02:46exceeding their authority, essentially, in so many different ways.

02:52Now, I get it.

02:54This particular defendant, they may believe, you know, shouldn't be the beneficiary of

02:58it.

02:59But again, there are much greater principles at stake.

03:02And I hope and I believe that the US Supreme Court can ultimately they're not so they understand

03:08what's at stake.

03:09And it's not just about R. Kelly, it's about everybody.

03:12And do we let the government continue to run amok in these federal prosecutions, whoever

03:17the defendant is?

03:18And I think the Supreme Court can do that.

03:21And I think we have a good chance of getting cert granted.

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Transcript

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