After a quiet couple of months, R. Kelly is back in the news and not in the way he’d probably like to be.
Back in January 2019, the documentary Surviving R. Kelly premiered, renewing calls for the long rumors of his sexual misconduct to be properly investigated.
In February, Kelly was indicted on 10 counts of aggravated criminal abuse involving four victims.
He turned himself into Chicago police, but he and his attorney Steve Greenberg denied everything and accused the alleged victims of lying.
The charges came after a video was presented to a grand jury allegedly showing Kelly engaging in sexual acts with a 14-year-old girl.
In early March, Kelly sat down for an interview with Gayle King, in which he became very emotional.
While he may have hoped that the interview would turn more people to his side, most of the response was centered around how mentally unstable he appeared.
“I’m fighting for my f***ing life!” he yelled through tears and even had to be held back from King at one point.
At this same time, Kelly was arrested again for unpaid child support payments.
He owed $161,000 and a judge ordered him jailed until it was paid in full. It was only three days before an anonymous person paid the whole amount and Kelly was released again.
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Since then, things have been fairly quiet.
But on May 30, 11 more charges were added to the original 10 from February. They included charges of aggravated criminal sexual assault, criminal sexual assault, and aggravated criminal sexual abuse.
Four of the new charges carry a potential maximum sentence of 30 years in prison.
All of the new counts have been confirmed to relate to alleged victim Jerhonda Pace.
Pace also confirmed the news in a public post on her Facebook page and called out those who have targeted her with personal attacks.
Greenberg also responded publicly via his Twitter account.
He states that since the new counts are all related to the same alleged crimes, he doesn’t believe that they make any difference in how they’ll fight them in court or the results of the coming trial.
All of the charges date to alleged incidents occurring between 1998 and 2010.
Sophia Ansari, a spokesperson for the Cook County Sheriff’s Office told CNN that Kelly is scheduled to appear next in court on June 6.
h/t: CNN
