The Latest Breaking News from Charles Freeman

R&B star Kelly was acquitted on similar charges in 2008, but much about the case has changed in the intervening years — mostly in favor of the prosecution.

CHICAGO — A former girlfriend of R. Kelly’s sobbed in a federal courtroom Thursday as she testified that Kelly’s longtime business manager told her in 2007 they should have killed her instead of paying her to return an incriminating videotape of Kelly having sex with her and a 14-year-old girl.

CHICAGO — A former girlfriend of R. Kelly’s took the witness stand at his federal trial Thursday and testified that she had sexual contact with Kelly and his underage goddaughter at the behest of the singer, who also filmed and directed their encounters.

Featured prominently in the 2019 Lifetime docuseries “Surviving R. Kelly,” Van Allen is now a key witness in an alleged early-2000s conspiracy to recover tapes of Kelly sexually abusing an underage girl and to rig his earlier 2008 child pornography trial in Cook County.

Defense lawyers at R. Kelly’s child pornography trial in Chicago have sought to portray a key government witness as a liar and extortionist

CHICAGO — On Tuesday, Charles Freeman told a wild tale to jurors about how R. Kelly and his associates allegedly agreed to pay him up to a million dollars in the early 2000s to hunt down videotapes of the R&B singer sexually assaulting a young teen girl.

Kelly attorney Jennifer Bonjean tried to tick through all the crimes Charles Freeman could have been charged with had he not secured an immunity deal. The judge cut her off but she quipped, “It would take me too long to go through them all.”

Prosecutors at R. Kelly’s federal trial in Chicago have introduced evidence illustrating the singer’s desperation in the early 2000s to recover an alleged child pornography video featuring himself that had gone missing

CHICAGO — A key prosecution witness against R. Kelly has taken the stand in the disgraced R&B superstar’s federal trial and is expected to testify that he helped recover incriminating videotapes while Kelly was being investigated for sexual abuse.

Dressed in a blue suit and wearing sunglasses as he entered the courtroom, Charles Freeman grinned as he offered the most colorful testimony so far to jurors who have heard descriptions of everything from graphic sex abuse to dry bank records.