American R&B singer R. Kelly has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.
The judgment on Wednesday brings to an end a decades-long effort to recruit and trap teenagers and women for sex.
The judgement handed by Judge Ann Donnelly at Brooklyn federal court didn’t go down well for the 55-year-old singer.
The US attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York said in a tweet, “The verdict is in: R. Kelly has been sentenced to 30 years.”
The judgement directed the “I believe I can fly” artist to be put behind bars for the next 25 years, saying he “poses a serious danger to the public.”
R. Kelly was found guilty in September on nine charges, including the most serious of racketeering.
According to the sentencing memo, “His actions were brazen, manipulative, controlling, and coercive. He has shown no remorse or respect for the law.”
The disgraced singer’s defence lawyer had pleaded for a lighter sentence with a maximum of at least 17 years.
R.Kelly is still in another legal battle as he faces a separate long-delayed federal trial in Chicago on August 15.
This is the first time R. Kelly is forced to face the wrath of the law due to the abuse he had been rumoured to have inflicted on women and underage girls for decades.
“R. Kelly issued rules that many of his sexual partners were required to follow, including that the women and girls were to call him “Daddy”; they were not permitted to leave their rooms to eat or visit the bathroom without receiving his permission; they were required to wear baggy clothing when not accompanying Kelly to an event, and they were directed to keep their heads down and not look at or speak to other men. Kelly also isolated the women and girls from their friends and family and made them dependent on him for their financial well-being. He required the victims to engage in sex with him and others and recorded many of the sexual encounters,” the Department of Justice disclosed.
Breon Peace, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and Steve K. Francis, Acting Executive Associate Director, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), announced the sentence.
“R. Kelly used his fame, fortune and enablers to prey on the young, the vulnerable and the voiceless for his own sexual gratification, while many turned a blind eye,” stated U.S. Attorney Peace. “Through his actions, Kelly exhibited a callous disregard for the devastation his crimes had on his victims and has shown no remorse for his conduct. With today’s sentence, he has finally and appropriately been held accountable for his decades of abuse, exploitation and degradation of teenagers and other vulnerable young people. We hope that today’s sentence brings some measure of comfort and closure to the victims, including those who bravely testified at trial, and serves as long-overdue recognition that their voices deserve to be heard and their lives matter.”
