29th June 2022
Predator R. Kelly sentenced to 30 years in sex trafficking case
By NY Post
R. Kelly was sentenced to 30 years in prison Wednesday on charges he sexually abused multiple women and underage girls, capping off a dramatic downfall from the pinnacle of pop stardom in the ’90s.
US District Judge Ann Donnelly issued the sentence in Brooklyn federal court after the R&B singer was confronted by at least seven of his victims in an hours-long hearing.
“You made me do things that broke my spirit. I literally wished I would die because of how low you made me feel,” one woman told the Grammy-winner.
Kelly, 55, was convicted on nine charges, including racketeering and violating the Mann Act, which bars interstate transportation of women and girls for “immoral purposes.”
Prosecutors portrayed him as a serial predator over several decades who used his fame to exploit his victims, and asked the judge for a sentence of more than 25 years.
“Indeed, [Kelly’s] decades of crime appear to have been fueled by narcissism and a belief that his musical talent absolved him of any need to confirm his conduct – no matter how predatory, harmful, humiliating or abusive to others – to the structures of the law,” the US Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York said in a memo to the judge.
Among the numerous witnesses during the trial was accuser Jerhonda Pace, who said she began a relationship with the singer while she was underage. Once, while he was angry with her, he hit her and pushed her to perform oral sex on him, she told the court.
Another witness testified Kelly illegally married singer Aaliyah in 1994 because he was afraid she was pregnant and he believed their nuptials would block her from testifying against him and shield him from prosecution for having sex with a minor. Aaliyah, who died in a 2001 plane crash, used a forged ID that Kelly’s entourage allegedly obtained by bribing a public official, according to testimony.
Attorneys for the disgraced “I Believe I Can Fly” singer, whose full name is Robert Kelly, asked for a lenient sentence of 10 years or less, claiming Kelly had been raised in an abusive household and was himself the victim of sexual abuse.
Lawyer Jennifer Bonjean, who recently represented disgraced actor and comedian Bill Cosby, told the judge Kelly was sexually abused by a family member and a former landlord and that should be considered “a mitigating factor” in the sentencing.
The multi-platinum selling star is also “functionally illiterate” and had a traumatic, impoverished childhood that included him being shot by a stray .22 bullet and witnessing the death of a childhood friend, who was shoved into a river and drown.
“[Kelly] has been portrayed by the government and the media as a one-dimensional villain, undeserving of any measure of humanity or dignity,” Bonjean wrote. “This Court is charged with considering [Kelly’s] history and characteristics reveal that he is not an evil monster but a complex (unquestionably flawed) human-being who faced overwhelming challenges in childhood that shaped his adult life.”
Kelly’s fiancée, Joycelyn Savage, was among those who submitted letters of support for the Grammy winner. Savage declared she was not a victim of the singer and called the couple’s relationship “amazing.”
“The Robert I know is very sweet, gentle, and kind. At the end of the day, he has always made sure that I’m taken care of, and any other women he was with as well,” Savage wrote in her letter to the judge.
“Robert and I are deeply in love and it breaks my heart that the government has created a narrative that I’m a victim.”
Kelly didn’t testify during the trial, but famously broke into hysterics during an unhinged 2019 interview with CBS News’ Gayle King. The interview came in the wake of the damning series “Surviving R. Kelly,” which documented a slew of the allegations against him and he proclaimed his innocence and denied accusations he effectively held a woman captive in a cult.
“How stupid would it be for R. Kelly, with all I’ve been through, in my way, way past to hold somebody,” he railed.
“Guys, use your common sense, forget the blogs, forget how you feel about me, hate me if you want, love me if you want, but just use your common sense, how stupid would it be?”
Kelly is still facing charges in Minnesota of engaging in prostitution with a minor, as well as federal charges in Illinois of pornography and obstruction.
