Federal prosecutors on Friday asked a New York judge to admit a string of new allegations against R&B singer R. Kelly, including bribery and the alleged sexual abuse of a teenage boy. Kelly had not previously been charged with the new allegations, some of which date back to the 1990s.
In Friday’s court filing, prosecutors argued these latest allegations should be included in the singer’s upcoming criminal trial because they are “directly relevant to and inextricably intertwined with the evidence of the charged crimes.”
The filing alleges the Grammy-winning artist, real name Robert Sylvester Kelly, in 2006 sexually abused a 17-year-old boy, identified as John Doe #1.
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The filing claims Kelly met the teen at a McDonald’s in Chicago. The singer invited the boy to a party at his home, but the teen brought his parents along, the filing says. Kelly later invited the teen to visit his recording studio without his parents, and asked him “what he was willing to do to succeed in the music business,” the filing states. Kelly allegedly made clear he wanted the boy to “engage in sexual contact.”
According to the court documents, the teen introduced Kelly to a close male friend, described as John Doe #2, who was 16 or 17. Several years later, “Kelly started a sexual relationship with John Doe #2,” the filing says. Prosecutors allege the singer forced several of his girlfriends “to have sex with John Doe #2 upon his command and often filmed those encounters.”
Prosecutors also allege that in or about 1994, Kelly had one of his associates pay an Illinois state employee a $500 bribe to create a fake ID for R&B singer Aaliyah, who was then 15 years old, so the two could get married and she “could not be forced to testify against him (given the spousal privilege).”
Kelly is currently being held in New York City, where he is scheduled to go on trial Aug. 9.
He faces federal charges in New York and in Illinois for allegedly abusing girls and women for decades and allegedly running a criminal enterprise of managers, drivers, and bodyguards who helped him orchestrate the alleged abuse.
R. Kelly has pleaded not guilty to all of the charges.
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