R. Kelly has been sentenced to 30 years in prison for using his R&B superstar status to manipulate young fans into systematic sexual abuse. The singer and songwriter was convicted of racketeering and sex trafficking last year at a trial that gave notice to accusers who had once wondered if their shocking stories weren’t taken seriously because they were Black women.
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U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly gave the sentence at a courthouse in Brooklyn. The hearing today was nearly 3 hours, during the hearing Kelly did not address the court at all. According to FOX News, the victims all held hands while then the verdict was being read and R.Kelly didn’t make any reactions to his verdict.
R.Kelly’s victims told the court Wednesday that he had preyed on them at a young age and mislead his fans. “You made me do things that broke my spirit. I literally wished I would die because of how low you made me feel,” one woman told the Grammy-winning, multiplatinum-selling singer. She said she was forever traumatized by her teenage experience with him.
“Do you remember that?” she asked.
According to another victim Kelly manipulated his fans into thinking he wasn’t the man that the jury saw.
Victims “have sought to be heard and acknowledged,” she said. “We are no longer the preyed-on individuals we once were.”
A third woman, crying as she spoke, said Kelly’s conviction rebuilt her confidence in the legal system.
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According to the federal prosecutors “He lured young girls and boys into his orbit, often through empty or conditioned promises of assistance in developing a career in the entertainment industry or simply by playing into the minors’ understandable desire to meet and spend time with a popular celebrity.”
“Through his actions, [Kelly] exhibited a callous disregard for the very real effects that his crimes had on his victims and has shown no remorse for any of his conduct. Indeed, the defendant’s decades of crime appear to have been fueled by narcissism and a belief that his musical talent absolved him of any need to conform his conduct,” the government added.