Friday, June 13, 2008

Militant Ginger: Legal Genius?

A few weeks ago, I blogged about the case the Chicago District Attorney brought against popular rapper R Kelly - alleging he made a pornographic movie of him having sex with an underage girl.

My problem with this case? It was absent of any form of convincing evidence whatsoever. The case for the prosecution hung off a grainy VHS tape showing one man, who's face is never seen, having intimate relations with a young woman, who you apparently can't identify (and doesn't look underage.)

After seeing R Kelly's distinctive mole, which proved conclusively that he wasn't the man in the video, the jury took less than a day to come back with a unanimous verdict. R Kelly was cleared.

Witnesses also indicated that the girl in the video wasn't the (then) minor Kelly was accused of sleeping with (who is in her twenties now and vehemently denies being involved.)

The question still remains - if R Kelly was so clearly innocent, why did the Chicago District attorney's office spend six whole years building this case against him? How much did it cost? Aren't there real criminals they could be chasing (like Chicago slum lord - and friend of Barack Obama - Tony Rezko.)

At least it proved one important thing - that even against the overwhelming might of the Chicago District Attorney's Office, America is still a country in which you can get a fair trial.

4 comments:

The Chemist said...

I may not be a legal genius like you, but I'm certain that it was a case of people trying to make an example of a celebrity, which is fine and dandy when they actually do something wrong. I'm not a fan of R. Kelly, but I trust twelve people to figure out who's who in a video.

Unknown said...

Guilty or not there's still something creepy bout him. Just sayin.

Anonymous said...

i could not agree more about how crappy it is that so much time and money was wasted on this pathetic case.

Hope you had a great weekend, Roland!

Unknown said...

I have been a longtime huge RK fan and I never believed it for a minute after hearing the lack of evidence. This has been going on even longer than my bloody immigration from when I first applied! Ridiculous and a disgrace.