R. Kelly was sentenced in 2022 for child pornography to twenty years in prison.
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• Read also: R. Kelly sentenced to 20 years in prison for child pornography
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The singer of I Believe I Can Fly, aged 57, was sentenced in 2022 for three counts of producing child sexual abuse images and three counts of enticing minors for sexual purposes. In his appeal, the disgraced musician, whose full name is Robert Sylvester Kelly, argued that Illinois’ old statute of limitations — which required prosecutions for child sex crimes to be brought within ten years — should have apply, rather than the current law which allows prosecution while the accuser is still alive.
According to Sky News, his legal team also argued that charges against one accuser should have been tried separately from charges against three other accusers, because of the video evidence at the center of the Chicago trial. Federal prosecutors said the video showed R. Kelly abusing a young girl. The accuser, who remains anonymous, testified that she was 14 years old at the time the video was filmed.
The three-judge panel upheld the conviction and noted that jurors acquitted R. Kelly of seven of the 13 charges against him “even after viewing these horrific recordings.” They also said the harsh sentence was appropriate because of the “horrible, horrible” nature of Mr Kelly’s crimes.
R. Kelly’s lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean, told TMZ that the musician will now take his case to the Supreme Court. In 2022, he was also sentenced to thirty years in prison in New York for federal racketeering and sex trafficking, a sentence that runs concurrently with that imposed in Chicago.
