米歌手Ｒ・ケリー被告に禁錮３０年　性犯罪で

【ニューヨークＡＦＰ＝時事】米ニューヨーク州ブルックリンの連邦地裁は２９日、数十年にわたり性犯罪組織を率いていたとして有罪評決を受けていた米Ｒ＆Ｂ歌手のＲ・ケリー被告（５５）に、禁錮３０年の判決を言い渡した。（写真は米シカゴの裁判所に出廷したＲ・ケリー被告）
　検察は禁錮２５年を求刑していた。
　ケリー被告は「アイ・ビリーブ・アイ・キャン・フライ」などのヒット曲で知られ、グラミー賞を３度受賞している。
　被害者の一人、リゼット・マルティネスさんは裁判所の前で、被告が収監され「これ以上誰かを傷つけることがなくなるのに感謝する」と話した。
　ケリー被告は昨年９月、組織犯罪を含む９件の罪状すべてについて有罪評決を受けていた。
　弁護人のジェニファー・ボンジャン氏は、被告は性的に虐待されていたことも含め「混沌（こんとん）とした」家庭環境の被害者だと主張。記者団には控訴する予定だと述べた。
　ケリー被告の犯罪行為はセクハラ告発運動「＃ＭｅＴｏｏ（私も）」で表面化した。被告の大半を黒人女性が占めるという、これまでにない性的虐待裁判となった。
　裁判では被害者１１人を含む４５人の証人が呼ばれた。公判では、ケリー被告が自身の名声を利用し、立場の弱い人を餌食にしてきたことが明らかになった。被害者らはレイプや薬物混入、監禁、児童ポルノなどの被害に遭ったと証言した。
　被害者の多くはコンサート会場などで、被告の側近から連絡先を書いた紙を渡された。うち何人かは、被告に音楽業界デビューを後押しできると言われた。
　また、今回の裁判の核心となったのは、被告と歌手の故アリーヤさんとの関係だった。
　被告はアーリヤさんのファースト・アルバム「エイジ・エイント・ナッシング・バット・ア・ナンバー（年齢などただの数字）」をプロデュースした後、当時１５歳だったアーリヤさんと違法に結婚した。アーリヤさんを妊娠させたと思い、訴追を逃れるためだった。
　被告の元マネジャーは裁判で、２人の結婚を可能にするため、身分証明書の発行担当者に賄賂を渡しアーリヤさんの偽のＩＤを入手したと認めた。この結婚は後に、無効とされた。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/06/30-22:02）

Disgraced R&B singer R. Kelly was sentenced to 30 years behind bars on Wednesday for leading a decades-long effort to recruit and trap teenagers and women for sex.
The sentence, stiffer than the 25 years in prison that prosecutors had sought, caps a long downfall for the 55-year-old former superstar.
I'm grateful that Robert Sylvester Kelly is away and will stay away and will not be able to harm anyone else, victim Lizzette Martinez told reporters outside the Brooklyn federal court.
In September, the I Believe I Can Fly artist was found guilty on all nine charges he faced, including the most serious of racketeering.
The public has to be protected from behaviors like this, judge Ann Donnelly said, handing down the term.
Breon Peace, the US attorney for the Eastern District of New York hailed the sentence as a significant outcome for the 11 victims who testified about the horrific and sadistic abuse they endured.
Kelly's lawyers called for a lighter sentence with a maximum of approximately 17 years.
Attorney Jennifer Bonjean told the judge that her client was the product of a chaotic upbringing that included being sexually abused as a child.
Mr Kelly rejects that he's this monster, Bonjean said, later telling reporters outside court that she would appeal.
Kelly, a three-time Grammy Award-winner, chose not to speak at the hearing due to pending litigation.
The sentence comes just over a month before jury selection is due to start in Kelly's separate, long-delayed federal trial in Chicago on August 15.
In that case, Kelly and two of his former associates are alleged to have rigged the singer's 2008 pornography trial and hid years of sexual abuse of minors.
The musician who once dominated R&B also faces prosecution in two other state jurisdictions.
- #MeToo milestone -
Kelly's conviction in New York was widely seen as a milestone for the #MeToo movement: It was the first major sex abuse trial where the majority of accusers were Black women.
It was also the first time Kelly faced criminal consequences for the abuse he for decades was rumored to have inflicted on women and children.
Prosecutors were tasked with proving Kelly guilty of racketeering, a federal charge commonly associated with organized crime syndicates that depicted Kelly as the boss of an enterprise of associates who facilitated his abuse.
Calling 45 witnesses including 11 victims to the stand, they painstakingly presented a pattern of crimes they say the artist born Robert Sylvester Kelly carried out for years with impunity, capitalizing on his fame to prey on the less powerful.
To convict Kelly of racketeering, jurors had to find him guilty of at least two of 14 predicate acts -- the crimes elemental to the wider pattern of illegal wrongdoing.
Lurid testimony intended to prove those acts included rape, druggings, imprisonment and child pornography.
His accusers described events that often mirrored one another: Many of the alleged victims said they had met the singer at concerts or mall performances and were then handed slips of paper with Kelly's contact details by members of his entourage.
Several said they were told he could bolster their music industry aspirations.
But prosecutors argued all were instead indoctrinated into Kelly's world -- groomed for sex at his whim and kept in line by coercive means of control, including isolation and cruel disciplinary measures, recordings of which were played for the jury.
Core to the state's case was Kelly's relationship with the late singer Aaliyah.
Kelly wrote and produced her first album -- Age Ain't Nothin' But A Number -- before illegally marrying her when she was just 15 because he feared he had impregnated her.
His former manager admitted in court to bribing a worker to obtain fake identification allowing the union, which was later annulled.