Just days after suing the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York, R. Kelly has been removed from suicide watch.
via: New York Post
The “I Believe I Can Fly” singer was placed on the restriction at the Brooklyn federal jail where he is being held following last week’s sentencing.
He then filed suit against the jail, claiming the watch violated his constitutional rights and had caused “severe mental distress.”
In a court filing Tuesday morning, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn said Kelly had been taken off suicide watch at the Metropolitan Detention Center, rendering the lawsuit moot.
“Following a clinical assessment, Plaintiff Robert Sylvester Kelly, also known as ‘R. Kelly,’ was removed from suicide watch as of this morning, July 5, 2022,” prosecutors wrote.
Kelly’s lawyer Jennifer Bonjean had argued that her client being placed on watch was punitive and unnecessary.
“Mr. Kelly was placed on suicide watch for purely punitive reasons in violation of his Eighth Amendment rights,” Bonjean said in a statement last week before the suit was filed.
“MDC Brooklyn is being run like a gulag. My partner and I spoke with Mr. Kelly following his sentencing, he expressed that he was mentally fine and ONLY expressed concern that even though he was NOT suicidal, MDC would place him on suicide watch,” she added.
Bonjean vowed to continue her lawsuit despite the decision by the Bureau of Prisons to remove the disgraced R&B legend from suicide watch, she said in an email Tuesday.
“Not surprising that as soon as the BOP was going to have to account for their decisions, they removed him to moot out the motion. Our lawsuit will proceed nonetheless,” she wrote.
In addition to his 30-year prison sentence, Kelly was ordered to get treatment for an unspecified sexual disorder and will have five years of supervised release upon the completion of his sentence. In August, he’ll have another trial in Chicago — this time, for child pornography.
