“We were very, very appreciative of the fact that such an incredible number of celebrities would join our plea,” said Charles Bone, a lawyer in Nashville who took Ms. Brown’s case pro bono seven years ago and spoke to her by phone on Tuesday. “She was thrilled by the fact that people really cared.”

A Difficult Childhood

Ms. Brown’s birth mother testified that she drank a fifth of whiskey every day while she was pregnant, and Ms. Brown showed telltale signs of fetal alcohol syndrome, which slows brain development, Mr. Bone said.

She was adopted by a family in Clarksville, Tenn., but dropped out of elementary school and ran away to Nashville. When she was 16, she lived in a motel with a pimp known as “Kut Throat” who raped and abused her while forcing her to become a prostitute, Mr. Bone said.

“He would explain to me that some people were born whores, and that I was one, and I was a slut, and nobody’d want me but him, and the best thing I could do was just learn to be a good whore,” she testified, according to The Associated Press.

On Aug. 6, 2004, Johnny Allen, 43, picked her up in his truck and drove her to his home, where they got into bed, she told the police. When Mr. Allen reached under his bed, Ms. Brown thought he was reaching for a gun, according to court documents, so she pulled a handgun from her purse and shot him. She took money and two guns from Mr. Allen before leaving.