(Bloomberg) -- A lawyer for R Kelly said that the government’s efforts to seize more than $28,000 in her client’s prison inmate account was “unprecedented” and asked a federal judge to return the money immediately.

Jennifer Bonjean said prosecutors failed to prove Kelly defaulted on paying $140,000 in fines and restitution imposed upon him when he was sentenced in June to serve 30 years in prison for sex-trafficking.

She argued in a letter to the court filed late Tuesday that prosecutors acted prematurely by freezing all but $500 in Kelly’s inmate account and asked the court to not only sanction prosecutors but “order the immediate return of Mr. Kelly’s property.”

“While victims may have the right to full and timely restitution, they have no right to have the government seize an inmate’s funds prior to the entry of a restitution judgment,” Bonjean said in the letter. The US “acted prematurely” in seizing the funds, Bonjean said “without providing any evidence that Mr. Kelly has defaulted on payment of a fine that was only entered 35 days ago.”

Prosecutors last week wrote to US District Judge Ann Donnelly in Brooklyn, New York saying that Kelly hadn’t paid any of the criminal penalties imposed while amassing $28,328.24 in his inmate account, which can be used to buy food and items at the prison commissary. They asked her to put the money into an interest-bearing account “pending a determination as to the amount and applicability of a restitution judgment.”

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