Adapted from a story by The Washington Post’s Antonia Noori Farzan and Deanna Paul.
The 13-count indictment, brought by the U.S. attorney’s office for the Northern District of Illinois, includes charges of child pornography, enticing a minor to engage in criminal sexual activity and obstruction of justice, Joseph D. Fitzpatrick, an assistant United States attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, told The Washington Post.
Kelly is expected to be arraigned in federal court in Chicago on Friday.
Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn unsealed a separate five-count indictment against Kelly on Friday, including charges of racketeering.
In addition to Kelly, two of his former employees — Derrel McDavid and Milton Brown — were charged in the Chicago case with conspiracy to receive child pornography. McDavid was also charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice.
Steve Greenberg, Kelly’s attorney, said in a statement Friday that the singer was aware of the investigations and the charges were not a surprise. “He and his lawyers look forward to his day in court, to the truth coming out and to his vindication from what has been an unprecedented assault by others for their own personal gain.“
The entertainer’s legal troubles have mounted in recent months after a Lifetime docuseries, “Surviving R. Kelly,” brought renewed attention to decades’ worth of sexual-misconduct allegations. In February, Kelly was charged with 10 counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse, each carrying a potential sentence of three to seven years in prison, and spent three days in Chicago’s Cook County Jail before being released on a $1 million bond.
The charges filed against Kelly by Cook County prosecutors allege that he sexually abused four women, three of whom were minors at the time, between 1998 and 2010. It wasn’t immediately clear whether the new federal charges were related to those allegations.
Another 11 counts were added in May. Kelly has pleaded not guilty to all the state-level charges, and denied the allegations in an explosive March interview with “CBS This Morning” where he cursed, screamed, pounded his fists and cried, claiming that he had been “assassinated” and “buried alive” by his accusers.
Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx commended the “collaborative efforts” of her office and federal law enforcement in securing the new federal indictment.
“And let us be clear: this is not just about surviving R. Kelly. For most victims, it’s about surviving a less famous abuser, a trusted adult, or a total stranger,” she said in a statement Friday.
Allegations that he sexually abused young girls have dogged Kelly, whose real name is Robert S. Kelly, for decades. In 2008, he stood trial for child pornography charges stemming from a video that was sent to the Chicago Sun-Times that allegedly showed him having sex with and urinating on an underage girl. The girl and her parents refused to testify, and Kelly was acquitted on all counts.
Heightened scrutiny following the release of the Lifetime documentary resulted in Kelly being dropped from his record label and launched a movement, #MuteRKelly, which encouraged radio stations to stop playing the entertainer’s music. It also prompted authorities in Chicago to open new investigations into the sexual misconduct allegations, and plead for any potential victims to come forward.
“There is nothing to be done to investigate these allegations without the cooperation of both victims and witnesses,” Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx said at a news conference in January. “We cannot seek justice without you.”
