Meek Mill's request to overturn 2008 conviction denied

A judge denied Meek Mill’s request to vacate his decade-old drug and weapon conviction on grounds of a dishonest arresting officer.

Genece Brinkley, the judge who the 31-year-old rapper recently requested be removed from the case, cited Mill failed to meet his burden of proof in the opinion published Monday night.

This decision comes after Mill’s evidentiary hearing for his petition to retry his 2008 criminal trial on June 18.

Leading up to the 2008 conviction, Mill was arrested on charges of illegally carrying a firearm and drug possession. The hip hop star was sentenced to two years in county prison and eight years of probation.

In November 2017, he was jailed again for two to four years for violating probation through failing a drug test and not complying with his travel restrictions. In April, however, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ordered his release after a fierce legal campaign.

The Supreme Court echoed Mill's lawyers' concerns on the credibility of the now-retired officer in question in a court order on Mill’s petition under the Pennsylvania Post Conviction Relief Act, saying Mill was entitled relief.

Only serving five months of his most recent sentence, Mill announced he would focus on getting his intial convictions overturned.

The Philadelphia criminal court, and particularly Brinkley, received accusations of impartiality from Mill’s defense.

"Meek was unjustly convicted and should not have spent a single day in jail," Mill’s lawyer, Joe Tacopina told AP after the artist was released.

Brinkley defended herself in an April opinion, saying the court "has impartially and without prejudice presided over numerous proceedings in this matter since 2008."

Mill has earned publicity for bouts of legal trouble, starting in 2008 with his conviction and subsequent prison sentences for later parole violations on multiple occasions.