BROOKLYN (CN) — A New York jury convicted R. Kelly on Monday of running a career-spanning sex ring that included the late singer Aaliyah among scores of underage girls.
Kelly, 54, has been dogged by sexual abuse allegations dating back to the 1990s when his first hit song, "Bump N' Grind," spent a record-breaking 12 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot R&B Singles chart. The singer sat motionless, his eyes trained down, as the guilty verdict from a jury of seven men and five women was delivered on day two of deliberations in the Brooklyn federal courthouse. He nodded when U.S. District Judge Ann M. Donnelly commended his defense attorneys, after also giving kudos to prosecutors.
The conviction on all counts could mean life in prison for Kelly, who is scheduled to be sentenced next May.
In the top count — Kelly was charged with 14 acts violating federal anti-racketeering law — jurors found that the government proved all except for two kidnapping and Mann Act allegations pertaining to a woman who testified as Sonja that Kelly had sexually assaulted her in 2003 while she was drugged and unconscious. Kelly, whose full name is Robert Sylvester Kelly, was also charged and convicted of all eight counts against him under the Mann Act.
The 12 jurors said they each agreed with the verdict when Donnelly polled them. As they exited the room, at least four of them looked directly at Kelly, who wore a blue pinstriped suit, white dress shirt, light blue tie and glasses.
Kelly exited the room quickly after his verdict, escorted by suited U.S. marshals.
Defense attorney Deveraux Cannick said his team plans to appeal.
“Of course I’m disappointed with the verdict,” Cannick said while exiting the courtroom. “I think I’m even more disappointed with the prosecution bringing this case, given all the inconsistencies.”
Acting U.S. Attorney Jacquelyn M. Kasulis addressed reporters outside the courthouse.
“Today’s guilty verdict forever brands R. Kelly as a predator, who used his fame and fortune to prey on the young, the vulnerable, and the voiceless for his own sexual gratification,” Kasulis said, “a predator who used his inner circle to ensnare underage teenage girls, and young women and men, for decades in a sordid web of sex abuse, exploitation and degradation.”
While Courthouse News was part of a small group of journalists allowed into the main courtroom Monday, the six-week trial was otherwise off-limits to press and the public due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Spectators watched from an overflow room, and a coterie of Kelly's supporters also staged regular demonstrations outside the building. After Monday's verdict, that display included one woman blasting “I Admit,” a 19-minute song from 2018 in which Kelly reacted to some of the longstanding sex-abuse allegations against him. The song came out a full 16 years after the Chicago Sun-Times began investigating Kelly upon receiving a sex tape that appeared to show the singer having sex with an underage girl and urinating on her. In 2008, Kelly was acquitted of 21 counts of child pornography in Chicago.
In the Eastern District of New York, five Jane Does and one man spoke on the witness stand about life under Kelly's full control. The female victims said they had to ask Kelly or his associates for permission to eat or use the bathroom while staying with the singer at his home or studio. When out of the house, Kelly made them wear baggy clothes and face the wall to avoid eye contact with other men.
The singer made nearly constant videos of his sexual interactions, according to the testimony. He directed his girlfriends to have sex with each other and with men — sometimes strangers — with Kelly directing every move, even when the participants were unwilling.
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