Chris Brown is back in court, only this time Rihanna is standing by his side. The R&B bad boy appeared in court with his girlfriend and mother, Joyce Hawkins, to address the issue of the legitimacy of his reported community service record. In 2009, he was convicted of assaulting then-girlfriend Rihanna in a domestic dispute. Fast forward four years, the pair is back together and the ‘Diamonds’ singer is standing by her man.
Mark Geragos, Brown’s lawyer, denied the allegations that his client falsified his community service hours to the judge. The singer was sentenced to 180 day of community service four years ago and according to the D.A., there have been discrepancies in dates reported as community service dates. Brown is set to be released from probation soon and Geragos says that is the reason for the D.A.’s continued harassment of his client.
In a news conference after Wednesday’s hearing, Mr Geragos said: ‘I have never had a client who has been tortured like Chris Brown has.’ He noted that Brown’s girlfriend and subject of the 2009 case, Rihanna, was in court to support Brown because she was less than pleased with the allegations.
‘She’s completely supportive,’ said Brown’s lawyer. ‘She thinks it’s utterly ridiculous.’
Mr Geragos also gave his opinion on why the D.A. is hounding his client over community service time long since completed: ‘The D.A. is paralyzed with the thought his probation will be terminated. If that happens they won’t be able to jock him around like they’ve been jocking him around.’
The entire fiasco stems from allegations made by L.A. prosecutors that there is no ‘credible’ evidence Brown finished his community service sentence for assaulting Rihanna back in 2009. The D.A.‘s office referenced other outbursts they say point to lingering anger management issues with the singer. Surely the recent scuffle with Frank Ocean is one incident they might have referenced when bringing forth these allegations.
The community service in question occurred in Virginia, the singer’s home state. Prosecutors filed a motion that lists issues with the “Beautiful People’ singers account of the hours spent performing community service in VA. They claim that the service was basically unsupervised, therefore there is not real way to determine if Brown actually completed the hours he reported.
On his Instagram account, Brown expressed his frustration saying: ‘I can handle the hate but enough is enough yo! ‘Im a human being and I honestly think I deserve respect i’m sick of being accused…I’m just tired of this sh**.
It’s been years since this incident occurred, however, the D.A. is just NOW figuring out that maybe the records weren’t accurate. While it’s clear that Brown has a lot that he needs to deal with in his life, the timing of this allegation does raise questions about the D.A.’s competency in handling the case.
Is Brown’s lawyer correct? Is this just a ploy to keep Brown on probation and thereby keep tabs on him?