Prosecutors have reportedly asked a judge to sentence singer R. Kelly to an additional 25 years in prison for his convictions in a Chicago trial last year, gistpeople reports
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Kelly was found guilty in 2022 of three counts of child pornography and three counts of enticing a minor.
If granted, the 56-year-old would not be eligible for release until he is around 100, despite having only recently begun serving a 30-year sentence from a separate New York verdict in 2021.
Kelly was sentenced in Chicago after serving a 30-year sentence in New York, according to the government’s request.
Prosecutors described Kelly’s behavior as “sadistic,” calling him a “serial sexual predator” with no remorse who “poses a serious danger to society” in their sentencing recommendation filed on Thursday, February 16, in US District Court in Chicago.
‘The only way to ensure Kelly does not re-offend is to impose a sentence that will keep him in prison for the rest of his life,’ the government says in a 37-page filing.
The sentencing in Chicago is scheduled for next Thursday.
In a filing last week, Kelly’s lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean, stated that even with his existing 30-year New York sentence, ‘Kelly would have to defy all statistical odds to make it out of prison alive.’
She stated that the average life expectancy of inmates is 64 years. She suggested a sentence of about ten years, at the low end of the sentencing guidelines range, to be served concurrently with the New York sentence.
Ms Bonjean argued for a lighter sentence because Kelly, who is black, was singled out for behavior that white rock stars have gotten away with for decades.
‘No one has been charged, and no one will die in prison,’ she wrote.
After six weeks of trials, the singer was found guilty on all nine counts of a superseding indictment charging him with racketeering based on criminal conduct such as sexual exploitation, forced labor, and Mann Act violations in September 2021.
The Mann Act makes using interstate or foreign commerce to transport women for ‘immoral purposes’ illegal.
Bonjean has stated that she will appeal the 30-year prison sentence imposed in New York.
Prosecutors in the Chicago case acknowledged that a 25-year sentence would be longer than even sentencing guidelines recommend, but they argued that imposing a long sentence and mandating that it be served only after the New York sentence was appropriate.
‘Given the egregiousness of Kelly’s conduct, a consecutive sentence is eminently reasonable,’ the filing argued. ‘Kelly’s sexual abuse of minors was deliberate and widespread.’
Last year, jurors in Chicago convicted the Grammy Award-winning singer on six of 13 counts, but the government lost the main charge that Kelly and his then-business manager rigged his state child pornography trial in 2008.
Kelly’s co-defendants, including longtime business manager Derrel McDavid, were found not guilty on all counts.
Four women testified in the Chicago trial that R. Kelly sexually abused them while they were minors, including the woman who identified herself as a victim of sexual abuse in a videotape at the center of the singer’s 2008 trial.
R. Kelly was accused of filming himself having sex with a 14-year-old girl in 2008, but the jury acquitted him due to the girl’s lack of testimony.
The girl, who went by the alias ‘Jane,’ then became a key witness in the prosecutors’ case in Chicago, testifying that Kelly sexually abused her hundreds of times beginning in 1998, when she was 14 years old.
Kelly ‘took advantage of Jane’s youth,’ according to prosecutor Assistant U.S. Attorney Elizabeth Pozolo. He abused her on numerous occasions. ‘He did degrading things to her for his sick pleasure,’ she said.
The defense cast doubt on some of the accusers, claiming that at least one was under the legal age of consent at the time. Kelly declined to take the stand.
After a four-week trial, the singer was found guilty of three counts of child pornography and three counts of child enticement.
His legal team is also appealing the Chicago convictions.
Despite the 2008 trial, criminal investigations gained traction following the 2019 release of the docuseries ‘Surviving R. Kelly,’ which featured testimonials from his accusers.
The investigations resulted in new federal and state charges.
On the recommendation of Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, who said she was comfortable dropping the case because Kelly would spend decades in prison for his federal convictions, an Illinois judge dismissed state sex abuse charges prior to a trial in January.
With just the New York convictions, he would not have been eligible for release until he was around 80 years old.
