R Kellys 25 years of Terror

➡ In 2002, famous R&B artist R. Kelly was accused of committing serious crimes against his young goddaughter, which he filmed. Despite the video evidence, he was acquitted of all charges, causing public outrage. This case is often cited as an example of the law failing to punish a criminal. The story also highlights Kelly’s rise to fame, his relationship with his goddaughter, and the shocking details of his trial.
➡ R. Kelly, a famous singer, was accused of illegal activities involving minors, with evidence including a video and testimonies from victims. Despite the evidence, he was found not guilty in his first trial due to the main victim refusing to testify. However, years later, a documentary called “Surviving R. Kelly” reignited public outrage, leading to new investigations and his eventual conviction. Despite his claims of innocence, Kelly faced multiple charges and was ultimately imprisoned.
➡ R. Kelly, a famous singer, was finally sentenced to 31 years in prison after years of exploiting young girls. Despite being arrested in 2002, he was protected by his record label and fans, allowing him to continue his harmful actions. It took a public movement and a documentary to finally get him arrested. This highlights the problem of the music industry protecting profitable artists, even when they are causing harm.

On June 5th, 2002, R. Kelly was arrested and charged with some alarming crimes involving a young girl who happened to be his goddaughter. While his fans didn’t want to believe the allegations, Kelly made it extremely difficult to deny them as he decided to film the incident. He thought it would be a great idea to make a home video of his disgusting crimes. Unfortunately for Kelly, this video didn’t stay in his private collections, as the videotape of Kelly’s horrific crimes ended up being stolen and spread around. Kelly was caught on camera and he was going to have to face these allegations in court.

But even with this videotape and mountains of evidence proving he did it, Kelly walked out of the court a free man, being acquitted of all charges. Still to this day, many people can’t believe they let Kelly get away with it with all that undeniable evidence. Being one of the most obvious times, the law worked to protect the criminal instead of taking him down. A trend we have seen repeatedly over the years since R. Kelly. Hey guys, I hope all is well. Welcome back to the Truth is where I drop new videos exposing the truth weekly.

Today we will be looking at the time the law protected the worst of all monsters, R. Kelly, and let him do his crimes for another 20 years. Let’s get right into it. In the 2000s, R. Kelly was one of the biggest R&B artists in the world. Fresh off his smash hit ignition and running the industry for years, he was at the top of his career. But when Kelly least expected it, his world would be turned upside down. He became the center of a horrifying scandal which changed his career forever. The story of R.

Kelly’s legal troubles go back to 1997, when he met Roshana Landfair, who was 12 or 13 years old at the time. Landfair was introduced to Kelly by her aunt, the singer Sparkle, who was a protégé of Kelly’s and was working on her own debut album at the time. Sparkle asked Landfair’s parents to bring her to the studio so Kelly could hear her rap, hoping he would help her music career. After Kelly met Roshana, he started spending plenty of time with her, with Roshana calling their time together grooming sessions. Eventually Kelly was offered to become Roshana’s godfather by her aunt, Sparkles.

Kelly accepted the offer and used this as an opportunity to take advantage of Roshana. As soon as he took on the role, he started his inappropriate relationship with her. Between 1998 and 2000, Kelly did horrible things to his goddaughter. In at least one of those instances, he decided he would record it for god knows what reason. After making the video, Kelly kept it right in his collections of home videos. It doesn’t seem like he tried to hide his extremely incriminating tape at all, as out of nowhere, the tape would be stolen from his home by a disgruntled employee.

This person then made copies of the tape and leaked it. Eventually the tape was floating around the internet and even made its way to the streets, as bootleggers were selling Kelly’s tape alongside the latest blockbuster movie. The tape of Kelly was spreading like wildfire, and it wouldn’t be long before the tape landed in the hands of the media. In 2002, someone working in the Chicago Sun-Times mailroom opened up an envelope that was sent to the news station anonymously through FedEx. The envelope was addressed to a reporter named Jim DeRagatis. Inside the envelope was an unmarked tape, and when those at the news stations played the tape, they saw the biggest R&B singer in the world bumping and grinding with his own teenage goddaughter.

This tape was exactly what Jim was waiting for, as he had been trying to expose Kelly for months now, previously reporting on other allegations made against Kelly with young girls. Now, out of nowhere, the undeniable proof he needed to bring Kelly down landed on his lap. According to the news, the over 27-minute long video tape seemed to show R Kelly engaging in x-acts with the young girl, with one part of the video showing Kelly going number one on the victim to say it lightly. The hottest rhythm and blues singer in America, R Kelly, the man Vibe magazine called The New Millennium Marvin Gaye, now in handcuffs, arrested in Florida, and charged in Chicago with 21 heinous times against an underage girl.

The key evidence a police, a videotape, made by the singer himself. FBI forensics experts from Quantico have closely examined the tape. They tell us it’s authentic. Police say the 40-minute tape, which first surfaced five months ago, was recorded inside Kelly’s house on this Chicago street. He has since moved to this suburban mansion. The video already screened with a grand jury that returned to three-page indictment, accusing Kelly of, among other things, soliciting, taping, and performing acts with a 15-year-old. Truly disgusting and deplorable behavior, and it seemed this was going to be the beginning of the end.

Not long after The New Station received the tape, they turned it into the authorities, and on February 8th, The Sun Times reported the horrific news about Kelly. This led to the police revealing they were investigating him. When the news broke, the world couldn’t believe the allegations against them, at least those who hadn’t already seen the tape. All lies were on Kelly, and people wanted answers. Even though the tape was a bestseller for bootleggers, and the media had already seen it as well, Kelly denied everything. Through his representatives, he suggested he was the victim of a smear campaign by individuals with personal agendas who sought out to damage his career.

During a local TV interview, he dismissed the accusations as crap before his performance at the Winter Olympics opening ceremony. While Kelly kept on denying any involvement in any crimes, it did little to help him with the law. In June 2002, a grand jury in Cook County, Illinois, returned an indictment against R. Kelly on 21 counts of CP. After the indictment was confirmed, Kelly agreed to turn himself into the Chicago Police Department. But instead, he ended up in Florida. This led to Chicago Police placing the arrest warrant in a national crime database. While Kelly was chilling in his vacation home in Davenport, Florida, out of nowhere, the authorities showed up at his front door.

They presented him with a warrant and arrested him on the spot. While they were at his home, they searched his property only to find more evidence of his crimes, seizing a digital camera that allegedly contained additional images of him with a young girl, leading to 12 more counts of CP being filed in Florida. Kelly was then extradited from Florida to Chicago to face his charges. When he faced the judge, he denied all the charges, posting $750,000 bail, leading to his release the very next day after his arrest. Now after the indictment in 2002, Kelly was set to start trial months later.

But for many strange reasons, the start of the trial was delayed for six years, pushing the trial start date to May 2008. The case experienced multiple delays for several years following his indictment in June 2002. The reason for the delay included the proceeding judge injuring himself, a prosecutor having a baby, and R. Kelly missing a scheduled court appearance because his tour bus was stopped for speeding in Utah. On top of this, Kelly’s lawyer found every possible way to postpone the trial as long as possible. Eventually six years went by, and when the trial was finally set to start, many thought Kelly was truly cooked.

But even though there was so much evidence, like a literal tape that he made himself, Kelly still had the support of his fans. They showed up to the trial and declared Kelly an innocent man. They called the tape fake in an extortion attempt, a tape that the prosecution had formed their entire case around, and they were confident would sing Kelly. When the trial started, the prosecution’s main argument was that R. Kelly had sex with his own goddaughter when she was not legally old enough and produced a video recording of the incident.

During the trial, the prosecution showed the full 27-minute tape to the jury. Although the videotape was mailed to them anonymously, they cited several reasons why they believed Kelly was the individual in the tape. First, they proved that the tape wasn’t a fake. They brought in an FBI forensic expert who verified the authenticity of the tape, dismissing the defense claim that the video could have been faked or heavily altered. After proving the tape was in fact real, they presented their evidence on why the man in the tape was in fact R. Kelly. In the video, the man seen committing the crime had a mole on his back that was visible in the video.

The prosecution brought in a forensic expert to testify that a dark spot visible on the man’s lower back in the video was in the exact same position and about the same size as the mole on R. Kelly’s back, which was confirmed by photographs taken after his arrest. On top of this, the prosecution brought in a retired Chicago police detective who testified that the location where the video was filmed matched R. Kelly’s home in Chicago. He pointed out that R. Kelly had a log cabin themed room that matches the scenery that’s seen in the video.

The prosecution also pointed out that during the video, the man literally asked the girl in the video how old she was where she told him her age. The prosecution also tried to establish a pattern of behavior showing that R. Kelly had done this to others, like when he groomed and ended up marrying Aliyah when she was still a teen. But unfortunately for the prosecution, the judge didn’t allow that as evidence. The main problem the prosecution had was identifying the victim, who was only referred to as Jane Doe at the time that we now know is Rashawna Landfair.

Landfair not only refused to testify, but she went as far as denying it was even her in the video. This led to the prosecution accusing the victim and her family of being paid off in order to protect Kelly. But even without being able to introduce a pattern of behavior or identify the victim, the prosecution still felt they had a strong case as they had him dead to rights in a full on video. They likely thought that there was no way they were going to lose this case. Kelly was mainly represented by the attorney Edward Genson, who was known as the Dean of Chicago’s Criminal Defense Attorneys, named the go-to lawyer in town by Chicago Magazine.

Genson approached the trial with a minimalist approach. His defense argument was pretty much R. Kelly didn’t do it. He argued that the tape was a fake, even though the FBI confirmed it was real. He argued that the man in the video couldn’t be R. Kelly because Kelly had a mole on his back and the guy in the video did not, even though the prosecution had already confirmed that the man in the video did in fact have a mole in the same spot as Kelly. The defense argued that the alleged victim and her family were motivated by money, noting they hired a lawyer rather than going to the police, despite her having an aunt that was a police officer.

They also challenged the prosecution’s ability to definitively prove that the girl in the tape was in fact the minor. At the end of it all, although the prosecution had this very incriminating video of what seemed to be R. Kelly doing this crime, the jury will still find him not guilty on all counts after less than one day of deliberation. The main reason for the acquittal was the victims refused to testify at the time and the fact that she had previously denied to a grand jury that it was her in the video.

Just like that, Kelly walked right out of court a free man. As he walked out the court, he was greeted by his screaming fans who celebrated his victory. He successfully managed to beat the case and was vindicated by the courts, although they presented video evidence and it all pointed to Kelly being guilty, the courts declared the innocent. After the trial was over, Kelly didn’t waste no time, using all the media attention the trial had gotten him to further boost his career. He continued the tour and recorded new music. His career thrived and he released several hits during this period, selling millions of albums and packing concert venues.

It seemed like the man had put those allegations behind him and was back on top, but while Kelly was under the impression he had won and had put it all behind them, fast forward a few years later to 2017 and that illusion quickly faded. See, while Kelly was able to convince the courts and some of his fans that he was an innocent man, there was still one man who wasn’t buying it. The one person who started this off, who had been trying to expose Kelly for almost 20 years now, the reporter Jim Derogatis.

After Jim exposed them back in the 2000’s, he never stopped trying to bring them down. As in 2017, months before the rise of the Me Too movement, Jim dropped a new investigative report about R. Kelly this time for BuzzFeed. The article included accusations that R. Kelly had now set up his own ex-cole, with accusations from three sets of parents who claimed the singer was holding their daughters in an abusive controlling environment. The report alleged that Kelly controlled every aspect of the women’s lives, including what they ate, how they dressed, and when they bathed.

It was also alleged that the girls were required to call Kelly daddy. These allegations exploded in the media and sparked a new wave of public outrage and activism, including the launch of the mute R. Kelly movement. This mute R. Kelly movement would eventually cause the downfall of R. Kelly as we know it. After the mute R. Kelly movement started trending, it wasn’t long till it all finally caught up with him. On January 2019, the nail in the coffin for R. Kelly had been hammered in, when the documentary Surviving R. Kelly was released on Lifetime.

The documentary revealed a pattern of predatory behavior by Kelly dating back to the 1990s, including his illegal marriage to Aliyah in 1994. In the documentary, survivors detail how Kelly used his fame and wealth to groom victims, often promising to help their music careers. He would then allegedly isolate them from their families, confiscate their phones, and enforce strict cult-like rules in his home and studios. A major focus of the documentary was how the music industry, fans, and various enablers allowed Kelly’s alleged abuse to continue for over 25 years without serious legal or professional consequences, despite numerous lawsuits and the infamous 2008 CP trial in which he was acquitted.

The documentary was critically acclaimed and had a significant real-world impact, leading to renewed public reckoning and accelerating criminal investigations that ultimately resulted in R. Kelly’s conviction and imprisonment. Immediately after the documentary, the public sought out to put pressure on companies like Spotify, Apple Music, and Ticketmaster to stop working with Kelly, leading to canceled concerts and Kelly being dropped by RCA Records. Around this time, Kelly showed up to do an interview with Gayle King, where he tried to declare his innocence while crying like a baby. At one point during the conversation, he stood up and started yelling, telling Gayle King, I’m fighting for my effing life while visibly crying and hitting his chest.

During the interview, he also called his accusers liars and claimed he was being assassinated, but this did nothing to help him. His record label dropping him quickly became the least of his worries, as on February 22, 2019, Kelly was arrested by Chicago police on 10 counts of aggravated criminal essay related to four victims, three of whom were way too young at the time. Kelly would go on to turn himself in and was released on bail after a few days. The initial arrest will start a sequence of arrests as on March 6, 2019, he was taken back into custody for failing to pay over $160,000 in child support he owed to his ex-wife.

He was released a few days later when an anonymous person paid the full amount, which led to his third and final arrest on July 11, 2019. With the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois unsealed a 13-count indictment, including CP and obstruction of justice charges. A separate federal indictment for racketeering, kidnapping, and S-trafficking was also filed in the Eastern District of New York. After his arrest, R. Kelly faced two federal criminal trials, one in New York in 2021 and another in Chicago in 2022. Kelly was facing life in prison in the New York federal case and another 15 years for the CP case out of Chicago.

When the trial finally started, the prosecution went in guns blazing, using RICO charges to present a wide-ranging case, arguing that Kelly ran a criminal enterprise with his entourage to recruit and exploit women and young girls over the span of decades. This approach allowed them to introduce evidence of uncharged bad acts and a pattern of behavior stretching back to the 1990s, including his illegal marriage to Aaliyah. Unlike the last trial, this time the prosecution had a lineup of witnesses and victims eager to testify. Numerous victims and former associates told their stories, describing a world of physical and emotional abuse.

Witnesses described being forced to follow Kelly’s rules, call him daddy, and being punished for disobedience, sometimes through violence or degrading acts. A central part of the case revolved around the same evidence from Kelly’s 2008 trial, the 27-minute videotape from the early 2000s that showed Kelly essaying and going number one on his own goddaughter. But unlike his 2008 state trial, where he was acquitted because the victim did not testify, the woman who was now an adult testified at this trial, identifying herself as the person in the video and detailing how Kelly coerced her into lying to a grand jury years earlier.

For her testimony, landfare was spared of prison time for lying to the courts the first time around. Just like the last time, the defense’s argument was the exact same. R. Kelly didn’t do it. Kelly’s lawyer portrayed the accusers as groupies or superfans, seeking revenge or financial gain, and argued that the relationship were all consensual. The defense chose not to call Kelly to testify for obvious reasons. But when the trial was over, so was Kelly’s freedom. As both trials ended in his conviction and led to a combined sentence of 31 years in prison.

After over 25 years of taking advantage of young girls and destroying the lives of so many people, he was finally put exactly where he deserved to be since he was arrested in 2002. Which is where I find the problem with all of this. While yes, R. Kelly is now in prison, in reality, he should have been there since 2002, when he was arrested for producing CP with his own goddaughter. The same exact evidence they would end up using in the last trial that ended up resulting in his arrest. But for some reason it seemed like the courts, the record label and even his fans refused to put R.

Kelly away back in the 2000s. Think about it, if they would have successfully convicted him then so many other young girls would have not been victimized by him. I honestly believe that R. Kelly was protected back in his 2008 trial. He was still a top selling artist for RCA Records and was a cash cow for them. So I believe they likely did everything in their power to make that problem go away for Kelly. They protected their investment using their powerful connections to get Kelly out of his jam. I also have to call out his fans too, as they helped paint this image that R.

Kelly was innocent, even though that tape clearly showed them as the monster he is. The music industry fans and the courts allowed Kelly to keep doing what he was doing, allowing him to literally re-offend god knows how many times. By the time he was finally arrested, he had formed a full on ex-coat taking advantage of so many young girls. And the sad part of all of this is that the only reason he ended up behind bars was because of the mute R. Kelly movement trending. It literally took a documentary and a full on mass movement from the public to get R.

Kelly arrested, even though the courts and the music industry already knew he was guilty. I also find it quite interesting that the record labels dropped Kelly this time before the trial started. They did this because they were in the middle of the Me Too movement and they would look like monsters if they continued to protect Kelly like they did in the 2000s. So they dropped them and this time without their help, the trial ended completely different than the last time. Clearly, everyone turned a blind eye when it came to R.

Kelly’s crimes in the 90s and 2000s. But because he was printing money for RCA, he was allowed to continue to destroy countless lives. This exact situation continues to happen in the industry. We literally just saw it go down with Diddy. Nobody believed any of the victims who exposed Diddy until he was arrested. Just like Kelly, the signs were there early, but they protected Diddy because he was an asset to the industry. We as the people have to stand up for what is right. We must never cover up for monsters because we love their music and are fans of them.

R. Kelly is the perfect example of what kind of monster you can create by doing this. One that ends up destroying the lives of countless young girls for over 20 years. [tr:trw].