CHICAGO (WLS) — Attorneys began closing arguments Monday morning in R. Kelly’s federal trial at the Dirksen Federal Building in Chicago.
Supporters of the R&B singer walked in before the 10 a.m. start, as Kelly faces more years in prison.
Closing arguments are expected to take hours.
“The prosecution is gonna trot out those tapes. It’s gonna revisit the testimony given by the main witness, and it’s gonna say its proved its case against R. Kelly and his co-defendants. R Kelly attorneys will talk about how none of those witnesses are credible. ‘You cant believe any of them, ladies and gentlemen of the jury.’ That’s what we’re gonna hear over many hours.”
R. Kelly is charged with trial-fixing, child pornography and enticing minors for sex.
The 55-year-old has been the subject of different sexual abuse allegations for nearly two decades.
Kelly was already sentenced to 30 years in prison, after he was convicted in a separate case in New York.
This complaint also names Kelly’s former manager, Darrell McDavid, and employee, Milton Brown, for allegedly paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to recover child sex tapes.
Soffer weighed in on the possible repercussions of the trial.
“If convicted here, R. Kelly is looking at decades in jail, and we have to remember he already has been sentenced to decades in jail in the New York conviction, so effectively we’re looking at life imprisonment for him,” Soffer said. “The judge could decide to let him serve them concurrently to the sentence in New York, if he gets more time here in Chicago then he did in NY, he’ll serve those extra years on top of it. He’s still appealing the New York case. If he wins that appeal, then the only sentence he’d be looking at is the one here in Chicago.”
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