R. Kelly Found Guilty On Child Porn Charges

• A federal jury in Chicago on Wednesday found former R&B star R. Kelly guilty on three counts of child pornography and three counts of child enticement. The AP reports that the jury acquitted Kelly, 55, on a fourth pornography count as well as a conspiracy to obstruct justice charge accusing him fixing his state child pornography trial in 2008. He was found not guilty on all three counts of conspiring to receive child pornography and for two further enticement charges. His two co-defendants were found not guilty on all charges.

During this latest trial, prosecutors sought to paint a picture of Kelly, born Robert Sylvester Kelly as a master manipulator who used his fame and wealth to reel in star-stuck fans, some of them minors, to sexually abuse then discard them. Kelly was desperate to recover child porn videos he made and lugged around in a gym bag, witnesses said. They said he offered up to $1 million to recover missing videos before his 2008 trial, knowing they would land him in legal peril. The conspiracy to hide his abuse ran from 2000 to 2020, prosecutors said.

Jurors acquitted two longtime Kelly associates — Derrel McDavid, who was accused of conspiring with Kelly to rig the 2008 trial, and Milton Brown, who was acquitted of receiving child porn.

Kelly originally faced 13 counts. A conviction of just one count of child pornography carries a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years, while receipt of child pornography carries a mandatory minimum of five years. Judges can order that defendants sentenced earlier in separate cases serve their new sentence simultaneously with or only after the first term is fully served. Federal inmates must serve at least 85% of their sentences.

• Let’s not forget that Kelly was sentenced to 30 years in prison in June after a jury in Brooklyn convicted him last year of racketeering and sex trafficking charges; and he’s still facing additional trials.