Lawyers for R Kelly say in new judicial documents that the convicted sex trade and singer was recently taken to the hospital after a medical overdose in prison.
The 58-year-old reported on Friday at the Federal Correctional Institute in Butner, North Carolina, which specializes in sex offenders in housing and was transported to Duke University Hospital.
In a new court that was assessed by the Guardian on Monday, Kelly's lawyers claim that he was placed in lonely imprisonment on 10 June and received medication by prison staff – together with “instructions to take it”.
According to the application, Kelly woke up in the early morning hours of June 13 and felt “faint”, “dizzy” and “he began to see black spots in his vision”.
“Kelly tried to get up, but fell to the ground,” the application claims. “He crawled to the door of the cell and lost consciousness.”
The document claims that Kelly was then placed on a stretcher and was taken to Duke University Hospital by ambulance. During the ambulance ride, Kelly reportedly heard a prison officer say: “This is going to open a whole new can of worms.”
In the hospital, Kelly's lawyers say that he “learned that he had given an overdosish amount of his medicines that threatened his life”. They also say that he “needed two days of hospitalization”.
The Bureau of Prisons refused to comment on USA Today, which for the first time reported the application, with reference to “pending lawsuits”.
On Monday it was submission after an emergency movement by Kelly's lawyers in which they claimed that three Bureau or Prisons officials had orchestrated a conspiracy to be killed by another prisoner. That motion requested Kelly to be released to house detention.
Federal prosecutors have opposed that request.
“Kelly is a productive child abuser,” wrote the prosecutors. “He is not apologetically about it. Kelly has never taken responsibility for his years of abuse of children, and he will probably never do that.
“Kelly now asks this court to release him indefinitely from imprisonment under the guise of a imaginative conspiracy,” the prosecutors added. “Kelly's motion makes a mockery of the damage that Kelly's victims have suffered.”
During Monday's application, Kelly's lawyers again asked that the judicial order in order to order a temporary leave.
Kelly was convicted in 2021 for racketeering and sex trade and sentenced to 30 years in prison. In 2022 he was also found guilty of three counts of producing images of sexual abuse of children and three counts of temptation for children. He received a 20-year prison sentence that must be operated simultaneously with his existing period.
