R. Kelly pleads not guilty to reworked federal sex abuse charges
R&B singer R. Kelly on Thursday pleaded not guilty to an updated federal indictment that includes sex abuse allegations involving a new accuser. Attorney Steve Greenberg entered the plea on the 53-year-old singer's behalf in Chicago federal court. Kelly stood next to Greenberg in orange jail garb, holding his hands behind his back.
The 13-count superseding indictment was unsealed last month and includes multiple counts accusing Kelly of child pornography. It is largely the same as the original indictment — which also had 13 counts — but includes a reference to a new accuser, referred to only as "Minor 6." But the indictment no longer includes any reference to a sixth accuser, meaning there are still a total of five alleged victims in the Chicago federal case.
Kelly faces several dozen counts of state and federal sexual misconduct charges in Illinois, Minnesota and New York, from sexual assault to heading a racketeering scheme aimed at supplying Kelly with girls. Kelly has maintained his innocence, including in an explosive interview with CBS News' Gayle King.
The Grammy-award winning musician was jailed in July and has been awaiting trial at a Chicago federal jail a block from the courthouse where he attends pretrial hearings. He has participated in hearings in his New York case by video.
The federal charges in Chicago accuse Kelly Kelly of having sex with five minors in the late 1990s and early 2000s, recording some of the alleged abuse on multiple videos. He's also accused of paying off potential witnesses in his 2008 trial — at which he was acquitted — to get them to change their stories.
The indictment offers few details about the new accuser.
It says she met Kelly around 1997 or 1998 when she would have been 14- or 15-years-old. It says Kelly engaged in sexual contact or sexual acts around that time and several years before she turned 18.
The New York indictment alleges Kelly for two decades ran a racketeering enterprise comprised of "managers, bodyguards, drivers, personal assistants and runners" who recruited women and girls for sex with Kelly and transported them around the country. It outlines allegations by five unnamed victims.
Prosecutors said during the hearing Thursday that it was likely there would be another superseding indictment against Kelly in the coming weeks, though they provided no details.
Also Thursday, U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber moved the trial date from April to October 13. Prosecutors revealed they" very recently" executed a search warrant in the case and seized at least 100 electronic devices, the Chicago Tribune reports, and wouldn't object to a trial delay to give them time to search the iPads, cellphones and hard drives.