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R. Kelly is going on trial in Chicago after being convicted in New York

R. Kelly's federal trial is about to begin. He is charged with 13 counts involving child pornography and obstruction of justice.
E. Jason Wambsgans
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R. Kelly's federal trial is about to begin. He is charged with 13 counts involving child pornography and obstruction of justice.

R. Kelly, the convicted sex offender and disgraced singer, is on trial — again.

Jury selection begins Monday for the 55-year-old's federal trial in Chicago.

Kelly is charged with 13 counts that include creating and receiving child pornography, enticing minors into illegal sexual activity and obstruction of justice.

Kelly's obstruction of justice charge ties back to a 2008 child pornography case in which he was acquitted. The jurors found Kelly not guilty on all counts, which hinged on the fact that an alleged victim did not testify.

Federal prosecutors say that witnesses and their families were threatened and paid off by Kelly and his associates before the previous trial.

Now, the alleged victim from the 2008 case is set to testify.

Kelly isn't the only defendant and will be tried alongside his former manager, Derrel McDavid, and his former employee, Milton Brown. All three defendants have pleaded not guilty.

Kelly was already convicted in a federal trial in New York

Kelly was already found guilty in another federal trial last year.

A federal judge in Brooklyn sentenced Kelly to 30 years in prison in June. A jury found him guilty last September on nine counts of sex trafficking and racketeering.

Eight of those counts found that Kelly violated the Mann Act, a federal law that prohibits people from transporting others across state lines for the purpose of prostitution.

Federal prosecutors were able to prove that Kelly led a criminal enterprise that sought to lure women, boys and girls to him for his own sexual gratification.

Part of the charges stemmed from Kelly's marriage to the late singer Aaliyah, who was 15 when Kelly was 27. Kelly was convicted of bribing an official to grant Aaliyah a fake ID.

Several alleged victims of Kelly's sexual abuse shared their stories in the Lifetime docuseries Surviving R. Kelly, which debuted in 2019 and helped bring more legal attention to the accusations.

Kelly also faces state charges in Illinois and Minnesota

Kelly, who has also faced multiple lawsuits, is also dealing with criminal state charges in Illinois and Minnesota.

Kelly was charged with 10 counts of aggravated sexual abuse in Illinois' Cook County in February 2019. That case involves four alleged victims — three of them are minors.

In May 2019, Kelly faced 11 more felony charges of sexual assault and sexual abuse filed by Cook County prosecutors.

Then in August 2019, Kelly was charged with two criminal offenses surrounding prostitution and solicitation in Minnesota's Hennepin County.

The Minnesota allegations stem from a 2001 incident following one of Kelly's promotional appearances in Minneapolis.

After a teenage girl purportedly asked Kelly for an autograph, the singer included his phone number with the autograph. The girl was allegedly told to go to his hotel after she called the number.

She was offered $200 to dance for him naked, prosecutors say. Kelly had sexual contact with the teenage girl and took off his clothes, according to prosecutors.

A trial date has not been set yet for either of those cases, according to CBS Minnesota.

Kelly's federal convictions, trials and state criminal charges don't cover all of the allegations he has faced since the 1990s. A more detailed history can be found here.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Shauneen Miranda
Shauneen Miranda is a summer 2022 Digital News intern.
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