Everything you need to know about the R. Kelly sex trial

Stop us if you've heard this one before: Sometime between January 1998 and October 2000, in a wood-paneled and jacuzzied room of an Illinois mansion, a girl age 13 to 15 is filmed in sundry sex acts with a man thought to be one of the planet's most prominent R&B icons. The girl featured in the tape provides the man a full-service fellating, for which she is rewarded with a face covered in ... urine. And afterward, ejaculate.

The case has it all: a look-alike brother who refuses to be the fall guy; an underage tart claiming to have once double-teamed R. Kelly with the video's alleged victim; an ill-tempered, media-averse judge; a rabid woman nursing dashed R&B dreams and gunning for the accused; and moreThe infamous video—which surfaced in 2002 behind a story exposing the same man's history of pursuing underage girls—led to 21 counts of child pornography for R. Kelly, the R&B icon in question. Since then, and despite his unshakable reputation as a sexual predator with a penchant for the Miley Cyrus set, the singer has kept on keeping on, writing and producing records, selling out concerts, and, in the process, floating his way through the six years since being charged. He's become a rolling punchline as beloved on the charts as he is reviled in polite conversation. Notes the New York Times: "If anything, his raunchiest songs got even more outlandish in the years after the report broke; what else could fans do but shrug and grin and sing along?"

But that may all come to an end on Friday, May 9, when the State of Illinois vs. Robert Sylvester Kelly is expected to begin in Chicago. It will certainly be an international spectacle. After all, beyond the peculiar savant on trial, the characters in this saga are as intricately—and humorously—cast as the artist's most ingeniously created masterworks: a look-alike brother unwilling to take the fall in exchange for cash and a recording contract; an underage tart claiming to have double-teamed R. Kelly with the video's alleged victim; an ill-tempered, media-averse judge; a woman nursing dashed R&B dreams and gunning for the accused ... it's a lot to take in. We want to help. Here, then, is Radar's field guide to the R. Kelly sex trial—all the players you'll need to know before the King of R&B gets his day in court.

The Suspect: Robert Sylvester Kelly, aka R. Kelly
The accused claims to be innocent of the charges against him, which in the current suit comes in at 14 counts of child pornography. And as simplistic as that sounds, it's a large portion of an argument the prosecution must overcome in order to get a conviction. But that won't stop them from highlighting R. Kelly's seedy history.

Kelly has settled three separate lawsuits concerning statutory sex-related accusations, but there's more to the story than that. Start with his marriage in 1994, at age 27, to aspiring 15-year-old singer Aaliyah Haughton, whom he also mentored and, well, "mentored." Her age was listed as 18 on the marriage certificate, but Vibe magazine obtained and published a copy of their doctored license, and the marriage was promptly annulled.

The earliest known case involving Kelly was settled in 1998 and stems from an illegal relationship from 1991; another suit alleged that a relationship ended in a coerced abortion; yet another case of sex with a minor was tossed out of criminal court in Florida after a judge ruled evidence (a digital camera) was illegally obtained; and so on. Of course, a settlement could simply indicate that Kelly hoped to excise the problem(s) before they became full-fledged incidents, and he's indicated in interviews that this is where he stands.

These past relationships—even that of the now-deceased Aaliyah—will likely be used by the prosecution in Kelly's current trial.

The Video
Aptly titled in places on the Internet Suck, Fuck, and Piss on Girl and R. Kelly Triple-X, the video at the center of the trial is said to have been filmed when the girl involved was as young as 13. How, you might ask, could authorities possibly deduce that sort of dating information via a God-knows-what-generation copy of a video? By the Backstreet Boys and Spice Girls soundtrack playing on a television in the background, naturally.

According to a ruling by Judge Vincent Gaughan, those who have yet to see the spot will soon be granted the displeasure, on the reasoning that if the alleged victim denies it's her in the video, there's nobody to protect. Still, if prosecutors choose to call the girl to the witness stand, it's unlikely that the video will be admitted as evidence, for fear that it will unduly influence the case. The reporter who broke the story and was sent the footage had this to say: "[T]his is not Tommy Lee and Pam Anderson. It's not fun and games. This girl has the disembodied look of a rape victim and he's urinating in her mouth. It's a sickening spectacle." But then, who's he to judge?

The defense team has maintained, at different times, that the tape is a forgery (it's since been authenticated by the FBI), that it is not R. Kelly in the video (screencap above), and that, even if it were, the girl is not underage. Authorities, for their part, seem certain: "We would not have proceeded if we weren't confident with the identification of the people on the tape," said Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine in 2002.

The Girl in Question
The alleged urinee has testified before a grand jury that she is not the girl in the video. No real surprise there—Kelly once referred to her as his "goddaughter" in liner notes. Nor is it surprising that the parents of the girl in question also claim she's not the girl in question.

It's important to note that the denial of pee-ternity burdens the prosecution with a case in which the purported victim claims not to be the victim—a matter that could (and should) cause reasonable doubt to at least some part of a jury.

Then there are those who are certain the person in the video is the girl who testified she was uninvolved. Most notably there is the girl's aunt, Sparkle (whom we'll meet in a moment), and a girl who claims to have tangled in a ménage à trois with her and Kelly—it seems a person this intimate might be called a friend (we'll meet her in a minute, too).

The Other Girls
Beyond the soiled laundry list of women—well, girls—with whom Kelly has settled lawsuits (and who are said to be on the current trial's witness lists), there are a few others who threaten to pose a more immediate threat. Perhaps most prominent is an as-yet unidentified woman who claims to have engaged in a threesome with the girl in the video and R. Kelly. Only recently floated as a potential witness, the emergence of the girl, now in her twenties, is the latest reason for which the defense team is seeking a postponement—a ruling will come on Friday.

Also set to appear is onetime R. Kelly protégé Sparkle, aka Stephanie Edwards, who enjoyed short-lived success when her mentor was featured in her video for "Be Careful." Sparkle has said she will testify that the girl is, in fact, her niece, and that the girl was between the ages of 13 and 15 at the time. Kelly maintains that Sparkle's is a case of sour grapes following a business deal in which she parted ways with Kelly over the follow-up to her Kelly-produced first record. If that's true, a refrain from the clip above—"You better be careful what you say to me / 'Cause it might turn around on you"—takes on a new sad and twisted meaning.

Judge Vincent Gaughan
This Cook County Criminal Court judge has held well over 100 hearings on the R. Kelly matter, most of which have taken place in closed chambers and resulted in numerous undisclosed findings. He's also thwarted transcriptions of those meetings and has effectively denied public participation in the trial—the Illinois Supreme Court seems to concur that publication of the information involved would taint the jury pool and render a fair trial impossible.

Gaughan's supervision has come in for other criticism—specifically, the fact that the case has still not come to trial. He has granted consistent leniency toward Kelly in terms of the singer's touring and concert schedules, hoping in turn to avoid the "unintended consequences" of fans, concert promoters, and municipalities losing out. In fact, the excessive delay, now better than six years, has some wondering if anyone wants to see the thing tried.

Carey Kelly
Hapless criminal wannabe soul singer, or harmless scapegoat for his superstar brother? Carey Kelly, Robert's younger sibling, has taken to the airwaves to address rumors that part of his brother's defense might be to toss him directly under the bus, arguing that Carey is the man featured in the video. In turn, he depicts his brother as an entitled misanthrope in need of mental and spiritual healing. The King of R&B is also, according to his convict brother, a bisexual, a heartless son who skimped on their dead mother's tombstone, and a serial pedophile guilty of sleeping with their 12-year-old cousin. Oh, and he's also prepared to corroborate that the girl in question is Sparkle's teenage niece. For those keeping score, that leaves R. Kelly, the girl in question, and the girl in question's family as the only parties who deny the story as laid out by the prosecution.

A deeper read suggests that the Kelly defense team needs someone else to be guilty in order for their client to be innocent, preferably someone who looks a lot like their client.

The Media
The Chicago Sun-Times (which has owned hometown boy R. Kelly's story since the beginning) and the Chicago Tribune are currently at war with the courts after being shut out of a number of critical hearings and motions by Judge Gaughan. A larger collective of media outlets, led by these two, sought a higher ruling on the trial's secrecy and argued in a motion that "[r]ecords and proceedings in the Kelly case have not only been sealed, but also sealed without any judicial findings with respect to the reasons for secrecy. These actions inherently exceed the circuit court's authority." They were quickly denied, with the state's higher court sending the issue back to Gaughan, who will rule on the matter—as well as another potential delay—on Friday.

Both of these organizations are obviously well-sourced in the city courts, but Sun-Times staffers Jim DeRogatis and Abdon M. Pallasch (the two authors of the story that started this whole mess) are considered among those with the most information (as limited as Judge Gaughan keeps it).

The Wife and the Babies
Oh, R. Kelly's married. Has been through most of this ordeal. He also has three kids. But you could be forgiven for not knowing this information given wife Andrea's skill at keeping the family out of the picture.

Andrea was a 22-year-old dancer in Kelly's touring entourage in 1994—the same year he wed 15-year-old Aaliyah. Following the annulment of that marriage, Kelly and Andrea tied the knot. Though the pair separated and filed for divorce in 2006, the divorce has not been finalized, and the couple is said by some to be working out their troubles. Andrea insists the separation (which included charges that Kelly had abused her) had nothing to do with the persistent sex allegations aimed at her husband. "When there is a storm, I won't leave you out in the rain. I'm no fair-weather wife," she told Essence in 2007. That interview was actually a sort of coming-out move on Andrea's part, and she has since reentered the world of dance and choreography.

The Attorneys
Defense attorneys for R. Kelly were pleased with the Supreme Court ruling that trial documents should remain sealed, a ruling based in part on the defense argument that prosecutors simply lagged in filing necessary paperwork. (Whenever you can backhand the opposing side by implying that they're getting the media to pick up their slack, it's a good thing.) Led by high-powered attorney Ed Genson, the defense team on Thursday requested yet another postponement in the trial—this time citing the media mayhem that's brewing. Ultimately, it seems like anything and everything can affect a delay in the trial: if it's not Kelly's appendix bursting, it's prosecutor Shauna Boliker's newborn baby, or it's Kelly getting pulled over by Utah police and missing his court date.

It is interesting to note that Genson represented Congressman Mel Reynolds when the representative was convicted on, among other things, child pornography for his explicit relationship with an underage girl. Does that mean anything to this trial? Not really. But then it's almost impossible to define what really does.