R. Kelly asks the US Supreme Court to overturn sex convictions

R Kelly is asking the United States Supreme Court to overturn his convictions for possession of child pornography and solicitation of sex with minors – claiming that his alleged actions occurred decades ago and that the charges are therefore barred by the statute of limitations.

Here’s the deal… when R. Kelly was charged in 2020 with possessing child pornography and engaging in sexual acts with underage girls in the mid-1990s, he argued that the statute of limitations had already expired.

But prosecutors argued that a 2003 law — called the PROTECT Act — made the statute of limitations for child crimes indefinite.

Actually, Kelly’s lawyer, Jennifer Bonjeanargues that because the conduct for which Kelly is now in prison occurred in the 1990s, but the PROTECT Act was not passed until 2003, the law’s extended statute of limitations does not apply to the charges against him.

The PROTECT Act indefinitely extends the statute of limitations for alleged crimes committed AFTER the law was enacted in 2003, but Congress specifically did not include a provision allowing the law to apply to alleged conduct committed before 2003.

You’ll recall that Kelly was convicted in 2020 of six of thirteen charges: three for child pornography and three for solicitation.

He received a 20-year prison sentence and was ordered to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in restitution to his alleged victims.