R. Kelly appeals to the US Supreme Court to reverse his conviction.

Former RnB superstar R. Kelly, born Robert Sylvester Kelly, is contesting his conviction after serving only two years of his prison sentence.

The 57-year-old artist was sentenced to 30 years in prison in 2021 for sex trafficking, child pornography, and racketeering following a trial in New York.

Several months later, he was convicted in a second federal trial in Chicago for enticing minors for sex and producing child sexual imagery.

He received a 20-year term for those crimes, but 19 of those years would be served concurrently with his previous sentence, making his expected release date 2045.

Now, through his attorney Jennifer Bonjean, Kelly is appealing to the United States Supreme Court to overturn his 2022 conviction for child pornography and inducing minors to have sex with him.

In the appeal, Bonjean argues that her client’s actions occurred decades ago and should be barred by the statute of limitations. She maintains that the statute of limitations had already expired.

Bonjean asserts that because Kelly’s conduct occurred in the ’90s, but the PROTECT Act wasn’t passed until 2003, the Act’s extended statute of limitations shouldn’t apply to the charges against him.

During the proceedings that led to Kelly’s 30-year sentence, prosecutors argued that the 2003 PROTECT Act made the statute of limitations indefinite for child sex crimes.

The PROTECT Act extends the statute of limitations indefinitely for alleged crimes committed after the law went into effect in 2003, but Congress specifically did not include a clause allowing the law to be applied retroactively to alleged conduct committed before 2003.

After years of allegations dating back to 1994, Kelly was found guilty in September 2021 of eight counts of sex trafficking and one of racketeering in a New York court.

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

Kelly had been in custody since being indicted by federal prosecutors in New York and Chicago in July 2019.

The former A-list musician also faced a separate trial in Chicago on child sex images and obstruction charges, as well as additional sex abuse charges in Illinois and Minnesota.

Within the next few months, the Supreme Court will decide whether to hear Kelly’s appeal.