Kelly Faces up to 5 Years Prison Sentence Post the Chicago Trial
It took Jane more than 20 years to take a stride and speak out regarding the sexual assault she endured under the command of her godfather, R. Kelly, the R&B icon.
Finally, Chicago’s federal jury decided to believe her.
They trusted her testimony that she was present in the gruesome music videos produced by the Grammy-winning musician, a man double her age.
They heard Jane’s heart-wrenching young voice and believed when they heard her in the graphic videos. Kelly’s guilt was finally determined by the court.
After Kelly made three videotapes in the late 1990s showing himself sexually abusing Jane, a federal jury found him guilty of child pornography charges. The result was in favor of Jane following a bitterly contested trial. The minimum sentence for the offenses Kelly was found guilty of was 10 years in prison.
Kelly was acquitted in Cook County on similar charges that were based on a single video clip from his former residence on West George Street showing him allegedly abusing Jane in a hot tub room. The infamous acquittal occurred 14 years prior to the conviction on those counts. Jane had declined to assist with the investigation earlier.
According to reports, Kelly was pleaded liable on Wednesday on three out of five counts of luring a minor. Two other victims also stepped forward to testify against Kelly.
Milton June Brown and Derrel McDavid, Kelly’s two former associates, were also exonerated of conspiring to get the video evidence that was shown in court. Jurors evidently decided that even while the tapes they had seen were real, they couldn’t prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Kelly’s crew planned to recover them or even intentionally acquired them.
Kelly additionally was acquitted of the charge that he had secretly recorded Jane and himself on a tape. The prosecution claimed that Video 4 was not shown because Kelly’s team was successful in burying it while the defense lawyers contested its very existence.
After a trial that lasted five weeks and included 34 witnesses, the long-awaited decision was reached. Before the verdict was read aloud in the huge ceremonial courtroom of the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse, the jury debated for approximately 11 hours over the course of two days.
