By Our Correspondent
Famous American R&B singer R. Kelly was Wednesday sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for multiple sex offences, including child trafficking.
A U.S. District Court Judge in Brooklyn, Ann Donnelly, also sentenced him to another five years of supervised release and a $100,000 fine for the charges of sex trafficking with underage girls and women.
A jury in New York City had already found the 55-year-old Grammy Award-winning singer guilty of trafficking and racketeering on nine counts in September last year.
The singer, whose real name is Robert Sylvester Kelly, has been detained at the Metropolitan detention centre in Brooklyn since that verdict.
His defence team had tried to get him a sentence of 10 years or less. They argued in court papers he should get a break in part because he “experienced a traumatic childhood involving severe, prolonged childhood sexual abuse, poverty, and violence”.
Prosecutors, however, sought a minimum 25-year term as the evidence was too overwhelming.
The court had heard from victims that the rapper, whose hits include “Ignition” and “I Believe I Can Fly,” had been abusing underage women for decades and there was even a video evidence that proved it, some impossible-to-watch footage of him confessing to his perversions.
They had described how he subjected them to perverse and sadistic whims when they were underage. Several said he would demand they strictly obey rules such as needing his permission to eat or go to the bathroom, and writing “apology letters” that purported to absolve him of wrongdoing.
After the sentence was passed down, the judge spoke directly to him, saying: “These crimes were calculated and carefully planned, and regularly executed for almost 25 years. You taught them that love is enslavement and violence.”
Kelly did not address the court, but his lawyer Jennifer Bonjean said he denies involvement in sex trafficking.
At a press conference after the sentencing, she announced they would appeal the decision.
“He disagrees with the characterisations that have been made about him,” she said.
