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Benzino has defended R. Kelly, stating he shouldn’t have gotten so much jail time for sexual abuse charges, leaving social media to blast his stance online.As R. Kelly continues to serve time in prison for child sex abuse charges including sex trafficking, Benzino has turned heads with asking why the disgraced singer is receiving such harsh punishment. The rapper and former co-founder of The Source voiced his opinion during the April 24 episode of his We In Miami Podcast. At the 12-minute mark of the episode, Benzino cites the fact that the age of consent in most states in America is at 16. “Again, the legal age is 16 years old,” Benzino said. “Does that make it right if a n—a does it? Yes or no?” After everyone collectively agreed it was “wrong” and “disgusting”, Benzino continued.
“Alright but it’s legal in America,” Benzino said. “Why the f—k is R. Kelly doing all this time? You know why because they’re 14 and 13. Two years younger. But you don’t think that the people who cleared it for 16 years old didn’t know that they were f—king with 13, 14-year-olds, too. For the age that young to be the law, you already know they goin’ under that. I’m not condoning with little girls, it’s sick. Alright, it’s sick, but I don’t think R. Kelly should rot in jail for 30 years either.”
The video went viral, with some bizarrely agreeing with Benzino, but many more blasting the Boston native for his comments given the heinous nature of R. Kelly’s crimes. Since the clip hit social media on Wednesday (May 1), the fallout has been constant with Benzino’s daughter Coi Leray emphatically distancing herself from him in posts on X, formerly Twitter. “I want everybody to know I want nothing to do with anything my father has going on,” she wrote. “I haven’t spoken to him in over a year and I don’t condone or respect any of them interviews he got going on. I don’t respect his decisions and I really want nothing to do with him please don’t even think of me when you see him.”
Check out some of the more bristling comments directed at Benzino below.
1. Uncle Demi
2. Mum Afrah
3. Kwintarget
4. Destroy Nectar
5. Vernj76
6. Vonshell Morgan
7. Nasa McMahon
8. Gullah Geechee Goddess
9. Sassington, M.C.
10. Alonzo Lerone
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Source: Cook County Department of Corrections / Cook County Department of Corrections
R. Kelly’s hopes of a lighter sentence are just hopes now. A Chicago court has dismissed his appeal to review his 20-year sentence.
AP News is reporting that the disgraced singer did not receive favorable news regarding his legal woes. Back in February his legal team appealed his original sentence citing that the federal child pornography and child enticement charges were filed after the statue of limitations had expired. Additionally, they claimed that the charges tied to one accuser should have been separated due to there being alleged video evidence. Last week a three judge committee ruled against the self proclaimed “King of R&B” stating the sentencing was indeed just.
“An even-handed jury found Kelly guilty, acquitting him on several charges even after viewing those abhorrent tapes. No statute of limitations saves him, and the resulting sentence was procedurally proper and – especially under these appalling circumstances- substantively fair” the court document read. In September 2022 the “I Believe I Can Fly” singer was found guilty on six counts of child pornography and child enticement. In an exclusive statement to Forbes Magazine his lawyer hinted at appealing at the federal court level saying “we are disappointed in the ruling but our fight is far from over.”
R. Kelly is currently serving his time at a medium security prison located in Butner, North Carolina. He is slated for release on Dec. 21, 2045.
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R. Kelly would probably be the last person most would expect to have an opinion on the legal issues Diddy is currently enduring, but the imprisoned singer has chimed in. During a recent Clubhouse chat, R. Kelly questioned the sex trafficking allegations Diddy is facing.
As seen on All Hip Hop, R. Kelly, 57, joined Wack 100 on Clubhouse and shared his views on the legal issues that the mogul, real name Sean Combs, is facing. In essence, Kelly stated bluntly that what’s happening to the Bad Boy Records honcho is nothing but falsehoods.
“The sh*t is crazy. Muthaf*ckas out there laughing and making comedian jokes and doing all the other sH*t on the radio and everything else, but they ass could be next,” Kelly is heard saying. “That’s what’s so f*cked up about it. They so stupid they don’t even realize the moves that’s going on.”
He added, “That’s why I don’t believe none of this sh*t. You could tell me about Puffy, you could about anybody in there. You could tell me on the news, the weather, the sky is blue, I’m not gonna believe the sh*t. ‘Cause I’m in it now, and I know what they did.”
It appears that Kelly is insinuating that the charges he’s currently serving time for and what Diddy is being accused of are part of some larger conspiracy to ruin the legacies and careers of the men.
The conversation with Wack 100 and R. Kelly can be heard in the clip below.
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Photo: Cook County Department of Corrections / Cook County Department of Corrections
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The lawyer for R. Kelly pleaded for the overturning of his sexual abuse conviction, claiming that prosecutors misused racketeering laws.
On Monday (March 18), the attorney for disgraced singer R. Kelly was in the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals which convened in Manhattan, NY, to appeal his convictions for running a decades-long scheme to recruit women and underage girls whom he sexually abused under the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act or RICO law.
Attorney Jennifer Bonjean argued before the three-judge panel that the application used by federal prosecutors to gain those convictions was “preposterous.”
“The government has extended the RICO statute to a set of circumstances that is so beyond what the framers intended, which was to get at organized crime,” Bonjean said to the judges. “Now, we’re talking about an organization with an alleged criminal, but not organized crime.” Bonjean also argued that it framed Kelly and those he worked with in an improper light related to the charges, which also included the production of child pornography. “This was not a collection of people who had a purpose to recruit girls for sexual abuse or child pornography,” she said. “Whether they turned a blind eye, whether some of them suspected that some of these girls were underage, that’s a whole different matter.”
Assistant United States Attorney Kayla Crews Bensing argued on behalf of the government and refuted Bonjean’s claims.
“The defendant had a system in place that lured young people into his orbit and then took over their lives,” she told the panel of judges, pointing to evidence that those who worked with Kelly knew of his intent and actions. “This is all evidence that the jury was entitled to infer that Kelly’s inner circle knew what was going on: that he was recruiting and maintaining underage women for sexual activity,” Bensing stated.
Bonjean also encountered pushback from the judges. “RICO is looking at organizations, that are then used to commit criminal acts,” Judge Denny Chin said regarding Bonjean’s argument on RICO. “It doesn’t have to be a criminal organization. It could be a completely legitimate organization. But if it engages in racketeering activity, it violates RICO.”
The panel is expected to rule on the appeal this week. While Bonjean has successfully gained an appeal in a similar case with Bill Cosby, the odds of the 57-year-old singer’s convictions being overturned are highly unlikely.
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Photo: E. JASON WAMBSGANS / Getty
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Source: Variety / Getty
Ye aka Kanye West compared himself to disgraced singer R. Kelly, Diddy, Bill Cosby and Jesus Christ in a new song at his Chicago show.
According to XXL, on Thursday (Feb. 8), Kanye West and Ty Dolla $ign took the stage at the United Center in Chicago for a preview listening experience for their album, Vultures Volume 1. One of the songs from the anticipated release, “Carnival,” featured what potentially could be one of the rapper’s most eyebrow-raising verses ever.
“This that Game of Thrones, Yeezy not the clones,” Ye raps. “Elon, where my rocket ship, it’s time to go home/They served us the corn since the day we was born/Anybody pissed off, gotta make them drink the urine/Now, I’m Ye Kelly, b—h/Now I’m Bill Cosby, b—h/Now I’m Puff Daddy rich.”
His verse on the song (which features Playboy Carti and Rich the Kid) continued:
“That’s ‘Me Too’ me rich/First she say she suck my d—k/Then, she say she ain’t suck my d—k/She ’gon take it up the a— like a ventriloquist/I mean, since Taylor Swift, since I had the Rollie on the wrist/I’m the new Jesus, b—h, I turn water into Cris’/This for what they did to Chris/They can’t do s—t with this,” Ye raps.
Ye performed this track and others dressed up in what’s now his customary all-black attire, wearing a white hockey mask similar to the one worn by Friday the 13th villain Jason Voorhees. It fit the scene as fans had entered the United Center while smoke machines began to emanate fog. The show also featured surprise appearances by his daughter, North West, and Bump J along with YG.
The listening event comes after Kanye West stated in an Instagram video that he was having trouble booking venues, alluding to his past controversial behavior and antisemitism. The album also has not dropped as expected. However, Ye is now set to hold another listening event, this time at the UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, Friday (Feb. 9). The venue announced a ticket pre-sale on the night of the United Center show with tickets beginning at $182 per seat. The album, which was expected to have been released at midnight on Friday, has not yet materialized.
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R. Kelly is pushing back against a $10.5 million lawsuit settlement against him, claiming that he could not address the lawsuit because he can’t read, among other reasons.
On Tuesday (January 16), legal documents were disclosed revealing R&B artist R. Kelly is challenging a $10.5 million settlement from a lawsuit that he lost in August 2023. Besides stating that he was unaware of it due to the number of lawsuits filed against him, Kelly claims he relies on his legal team to explain the lawsuits against him. “I rely on my lawyers to explain things to me because I cannot read or understand words beyond that of a grade-schooler,” Kelly said in the documents.
R. Kelly also reportedly argues in the documents that the co-defendant and former manager Donnell Russell should be solely responsible for paying the $10.5 million judgment that the court rendered. The lawsuit was filed by six women who claimed that in 2018, Kelly and Russell attempted to stop a screening of the documentary series Surviving R. Kelly in New York City, with Russell being accused of calling in a mass shooting threat to the movie theater where the screening was to take place. Kelly denied his involvement, saying that Russell wasn’t even his manager. “He did that for his own reasons,” the documents read.
Each woman in the lawsuit is slated to receive between $1.1 and $2.5 million from the judgment. These damages would be added to payments that the disgraced singer was ordered to pay out by U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly from his royalties. R. Kelly is currently in prison in North Carolina and is expected to serve out sentences totaling up to thirty years after being convicted of sex trafficking and racketeering. Russell was sentenced to one year in prison after being convicted of violent intimidation.
A statement from Kelly’s lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean, offered some clarification to the reports. “We are absolutely pushing back on the $10.5 million default judgment that was entered against him without notice and without a sound legal justification,” the statement began. “It would be simplistic and silly to write that the basis for our motion to vacate the windfall judgment relates solely to his illiteracy (although he is in fact functionally illiterate per formalized testing). The more significant problem is that there was no legal basis to enter the default judgment on the merits.”
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Source: Handout / Getty
R. Kelly has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government and prison officials for allegedly leaking his prison information before his Chicago-area trial to Tasha K.
On Monday (Nov. 13), R. Kelly filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court of Northern Illinois against the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, alleging that they leaked personal details about him before his infamous trial months ago. The lawsuit is also filed against the federal government as well as Latasha Kebe, better known as celebrity blogger Tasha K. Kelly is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence for enticing a minor into sexual activity and producing child pornography. He’s also been convicted in a separate case in New York for sex trafficking and racketeering.
In the documents of the lawsuit, R. Kelly alleges that “at least 60 BOP officers made unauthorized access to plaintiff’s sensitive, confidential, and private information maintained by the BOP.” The controversial singer specifically cited three of the unnamed prison officials who he claimed looked at his visitor logs and private calls and then struck a deal with Tasha K – presumably for money – to leak that information to her so that she could share it with her vast audience in her role as a celebrity blogger.
“He had every right to be able to be confident, to think the BOP would protect his information and not exploit, but unfortunately, certain BOP officers did just that,” said Jennifer Bonjean, R. Kelly’s attorney to ABC7 Chicago. “He does not feel comfortable to this day talking to anyone, even his own lawyers, because of the impact of this event.” One of the singer’s sisters, Lisa Kelly, expressed her dismay over the situation. “You’re listening to personal phone calls. You’re listening to recordings. That’s not right. That’s not right. That doesn’t sit well with me at all,” she said.
Tasha K apparently felt something was up, as she addressed the lawsuit on social media months before it was filed in January. It’s notable that she went to those lengths as she is currently under duress after losing a major lawsuit brought against her by Cardi B for defamation of character. The blogger had vowed to go to the Supreme Court after the verdict, which found her liable for $4 million in damages.
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Source: Amy Sussman / Getty
A few of R. Kelly’s victims who participated in the Surviving R. Kelly docuseries were subjected to all kinds of threats for exposing the self-proclaimed “R&B thug” and now a judge has decided to award them some monetary compensation for their troubles.
According to documents obtained by TMZ, six of the “I Wish” singer’s victims will be awarded a total of $10.5 million dollars straight from the pockets of R. Kelly and his manager, Donnell Russell, after successfully suing them for shutting down the 2018 screening of Surviving R. Kelly in New York City.
TMZ reports:
They alleged the defendants waged a campaign, starting back in May 2018, to intimidate the women, A&E/Lifetime and the producers to stop screening the docuseries. When those efforts, including legal threats, failed … they claimed Kelly’s camp called producers on the night of the NYC screening and said someone was “going to shoot up the place.”
The fake mass shooting threat worked, as the event was shut down — and according to the victims, it all opened up past trauma and resulted in them suffering PTSD and panic attacks.
Apparently, R. Kelly and his peoples didn’t want the public to hear his victims’ side of their story and will now have to pay dearly for it. Each of the six women will be compensated with a little more than $1 million each for their pain and suffering, but whether or not they’ll ever see a penny of that money is anyone’s guess as Kelly isn’t exactly rolling in it like he was in his very abundant heyday.
Though his music is still generating $500,000 in royalties from Universal Music Group to this day, who knows how long it will take for each woman to get their proper compensation.
What do y’all think of the judge’s decision? Too much or too little? Let us know in the comments section below.
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Source: Pool / Getty / R. Kelly
If R. Kelly lives to see the light of day again, his bank account will be severely light on funds, deservingly so because the Pied Piper of R&Pee has to pay back the victims of his crimes.
Spotted on TMZ Hip Hop, convicted rapist R. Kelly is not done paying back his victims. According to the celebrity gossip site, the “Only The Loot Can Make Me Happy” singer still owes over half a million bucks, and a judge is now hitting whatever’s left of his music royalties.
Per TMZ Hip Hop:
R. Kelly is still on the hook for more than half a million bucks in restitution to his victims — but they’ll be getting a big check soon thanks to his old hits.
According to docs, obtained by TMZ Hip Hop, a judge signed an order garnishing the embattled singer’s royalties … as it was discovered Universal Music Group is holding a bunch of his royalties.
So, the company will now cut a check to cover Kelly’s restitution bill.
UMG’s Remaining R.Kelly Royalties Will Cover The Balance
TMZ Hip Hop also reports that Kelly is on the hook for $506,950.26, and it just so happens that UMG has $567,444.19, which can definitely settle his remaining debts.That remaining cash could directly result from the people who can’t seem to let go of “Step in The Name of Love” and R. Kelly’s other songs and continue to stream them in protest of his conviction and pure heada**ery.
Before his trial, R. Kelly’s latest album “leaked” but was swiftly removed off streaming platforms, and both RCA and Sony dropped the disgraced singer/songwriter.
R. Kelly was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Chicago judge on top of the 30 years he was slapped with in his New York Case on top of the additional year he will serve in jail.
It’s a safe bet the streets will never hear or see Robert Kelly again.
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Photo: Pool / Getty
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R. Kelly was once considered one of the greatest R&B singers and songwriters of his generation until scandals upended his massive stardom and all but shattered his integrity. On Twitter, an intense debate regarding separating the artist from the music kicked off over the weekend and Gunna found himself in the middle of this ongoing conversation.
R. Kelly, 56, is currently serving time for sex crimes and racketeering charges that took place in his native Chicago and in New York. The beleaguered artist still enjoys a high amount of support from fans who believe the charges levied against Kelly were exaggerated or false. Still, Kelly’s music is largely missing from the modern landscape in the wake of all his legal troubles as it should be.
A Twitter user posed an interesting thought over the weekend when @amarihanifahh asked, “So y’all can separate the music from the artist with R. Kelly but not Gunna?”
The tweet was eventually grabbed by another Twitter account and shared, which got R. Kelly trending on Twitter for the past day and a half.
The question was probably asked because another Twitter account shared the reactions of Atlanta clubgoers after the DJ inside the establishment played a song from Gunna and the entire club stopped dancing. Gunna, as most might know, has earned the unsavory reputation of being a snitch amid the ongoing YSL RICO case with his former compatriot Young Thug and others connected to the matter.
Because some people lack context clues, most missed @amarihanifahh’s point in that it’s something of a contradiction that R. Kelly fans will still play his music despite years of accounts and court evidence backing why they shouldn’t instead of Gunna, who was seemingly let go on a legal technicality and testimony that can’t be used against the alleged YSL gang members on trial. Further, there is a lot of civilian opinion on street business that at least 90 percent of Twitter doesn’t know anything about.
Check out some of the tweets below.
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Photo: Getty
