R. Kelly trial: Jury wraps first day of deliberations after hearing closing arguments

After beginning deliberations shortly after 1 p.m., the jury left for the day around 4:45 p.m. They will resume deliberations at 9 a.m. Wednesday  

After U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber gave the jury their instructions for their deliberations, jurors left the courtroom to begin deciding Kelly's fate, and those of his co-defendants, Derrel McDavid and Milton "June" Brown.

Prosecutors got the last word in the trial, with Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeannice Appenteng delivering the government's rebuttal argument, quoting the singer's former business manager, Derrel McDavid, who told the jury "R. Kelly had to have what he wanted." 

"What R. Kelly wanted was to have sex with young girls," Appenteng said.

Appenteng told the jury they saw Kelly on video sexually abusing Jane, flipping her around "like a rag doll" in sex tapes.

Noting one of the videos show Kelly giving her money and pretending she's a prostitute and instructing her on how to act.

"When considering the evidence, use Jane as your base and your guide," she said. "Everything happened to her." 

Appenteng said, from beginning to end, it's all clear Kelly sexually abused Jane, and encouraged her to bring other young girls -- accusers Pauline and Brittany -- into their sexual relationship.

Noting that Kelly's attorneys have not disputed it's Jane on the tapes the jury saw during the trial, Appenteng said, "In terms of authenticity, there is no question."

Appenteng argued the jury knows Kelly's team kept Jane and her family from talking to the authorities about his abuse, noting the family's testimony that Kelly paid to send them out of the country when he was facing other criminal charges.

Turning to Derrel McDavid's testimony, Appenteng said it's simply not credible.

"He takes himself out of the situations that show he's guilty," pointing to McDavid's claims that he wasn't at a Kansas City meeting regarding the recovery of a sex tape, wasn't in an Oak Park hotel meeting with Kelly and Jane's parents, and wasn't paying attention to the sex tape shown at Kelly's 2008 child pornography trial even though he was in court.

Appenteng said McDavid even slipped up in his testimony, referring to the Oak Park hotel meeting as a delicate conversation, even though he claims he wasn't there.

"The time has come, hold him accountable," Appenteng told the jury.

Appenteng also argued former Kelly assistant Milton "June" Brown was a knowing part of the conspiracy, noting he referred to the video Van Allen took from Kelly as "the golden egg." Prosecutors have said that video shows a threesome between Kelly, Van Allen, and Jane, but the defense claims it shows Kelly, Van Allen, and Kelly's wife. 

As for the absence of testimony from one accuser, Brittany, Appenteng said both Jane and Pauline have told the jury about what Kelly did to Brittany when they were present.

Appenteng said when the jury reflects on the case, they should consider who is at the center of it: Kelly's victims. She said they were children when Kelly began sexual relationships with them, and the jury should find him guilty.

"The defendants are guilty of each count in the indictment. Hold them accountable," Appenteng said.  

R. Kelly's lead defense attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, called Kelly's ex-girlfriend, Lisa Van Allen, a thief and a liar. Van Allen testified at trial that she had threesomes with Kelly and his underage goddaughter, and later took one of the sex tapes of those encounters from his gym bag, and that Kelly's team later offered to pay her to get it back.

Bonjean argued if Van Allen knew there was a tape of her involving child pornography, for which she could have faced criminal charges, she would have destroyed it.

Telling the jury Van Allen stole a watch and a necklace from R. Kelly, and accusing her lying to Kelly about her age and needing a fake ID, and trying to frame co-defendant Milton Brown in that fake scenario, she said "there is no crime she won't commit."

Accusing prosecution witness Charles Freeman of trying to shake down Kelly over a sex tape, she argued Freeman got lucky when Kelly was charged with child pornography in the early 2000s, and tried to exploit it.

Bonjean insisted the tape of Lisa Van Allen having a threesome with Kelly was not child pornography, arguing the tape showed a threesome with Kelly's wife, not Jane, and said the reason Kelly didn't want it out there was to spare his wife the embarrassment. Regardless, Bonjean said jurors have not seen that tape, so they can't consider it against Kelly.

Bonjean said, even though we are in the era of "Just believe women," there is no place for that mob-like thinking in the courtroom, and the jury needs to have evidentiary proof to convict Kelly.

Turning to Kelly's accuser, "Tracy," Bonjean accused her of lying about her age when she met Kelly. Tracy has testified she was 16 at the time they started a sexual relationship, but Bonjean insisted she was 17.

"If there was ever a witness who could not be trusted, it was Tracy," Bonjean said. "There are people out there willing to lie about their age."

Bonjean noted that in a sexual misconduct lawsuit against Kelly, Tracy claimed she was 17 when she started having sex with Kelly, and that records from the internship she had at a record company where she met Kelly also show she was 17. Bonjean told the jury this means they have to reconsider all of Tracy's testimony and add a year to all of it.

As for Tracy's claim that she had a threesome with Kelly and Jane when both she and Jane were underage, Bonjean insisted it never happened, telling jurors the threesome wasn't mentioned in her lawsuit against Kelly.

"Everybody wants to claim a threesome with Jane," she said.

Bonjean also highlighted the fact that one of the women Kelly is charged with enticing into sex while she was a minor, "Brittany," did not testify at the trial.   

"Who is Brittany? Where is Brittany?" she said.

Bonjean said the government wants the jury to convict Kelly on a count involving a woman they never heard from, calling it "greediness on their part."

"I ask that you find Mr. Kelly not guilty..do your job. Take as long as you need…Mr. Kelly deserves it," Bonjean said as she completed her closing argument.

R. Kelly's lead defense attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, asked jurors to set aside what jurors knew about the singer before the trial, acknowledging most of it probably wasn't favorable, and to treat  him as a "John Doe." Bonjean said the jury must make their decision based only on the evidence they heard in the courtroom, not what they might know about Kelly through the media, or what they've heard about him elsewhere.

Bonjean said there has been an undercurrent during the trial from Kelly's co-defendants, who have suggested Kelly might have done some of the things he's accused of, but they didn't know about it. Reminding the jury that Kelly is presumed innocent until proven guilty, Bonjean said prosecutors still have the burden to prove every element of the charges beyond a reasonable doubt.

Pointing out some of the allegations against Kelly are more than 20 years old, Bonjean said that doesn't change the prosecution's burden of proof.

Bonjean also told the jury that much of the "unflattering evidence" they've heard about Kelly has nothing to do with the charges in the case, including past sexual abuse lawsuits filed against Kelly, and testimony about sex tapes involving a baseball player's wife, and "even a man." She said the jury can't consider any of that evidence, because it is not connected to any of the charges.

She also told the jury that their personal thoughts on Kelly's character isn't enough to convict him, saying the jury has to make their decision on the verdict based on whether the government has proved its case, even if they don't like Kelly.

Bonjean said prosecutors are baking on labels like "sex predator" to prevent the jury from scrutinizing the evidence, and asked jurors not to simply throw up their hands and say it's R. Kelly, "I want to go home and have dinner with my kids," and find him guilty.

Saying she would paint a more "fulsome" picture of Kelly than the portrait painted by the prosecution, Bonjean described Kelly as a shy, introverted kid who wanted to make it in the music industry when his career started in the 1990s.

Bonjean said Kelly struggled with his own trauma as a result of the sex abuse he suffered as a child.

She also said Kelly is a high school drop out who is still functionally illiterate, and wasn't able to understand the business side of his career, so he relied on his business manager, Derrel McDavid to handle the business, including signing all his checks.

Pointing to his 1990s ballad "I Believe I Can Fly," Bonjean said no matter what jurors might decide, Kelly did some beautiful things when it came to making music, and he shouldn't "be stripped of every bit of humanity he has."

Bonjean also compared some of the prosecution's witnesses, many of whom testified under immunity agreements with the government, to finding a cockroach in your soup. She said, if you find a cockroach in your soup, you don't just pull the cockroach out and eat the soup, you throw out the soup.

She said that's what the jury needs to do with witnesses like Charles Freeman and Lisa Van Allen, because there are "too many cockroaches" in the government's case.

Bonjean also argued the government's star witness, "Jane," who has said Kelly sexually abused her hundreds of times starting when she was 14, has a financial incentive in the case, saying the government helped her secure Section 8 housing for the rest of her life, and she didn't have to wait like most others do.

Turning to a meeting at an Oak Park hotel where Kelly allegedly confessed to Jane's parents that he'd been having sex with her when she was a girl, Bonjean said Jane and her mother's accounts of the meeting didn't match, but said it doesn't matter which of them the jury might believe, saying neither Jane nor her mother testified that Kelly asked them to lie.

Bonjean also told jurors that Jane's parents lied to a Cook County grand jury in the early 2000s because they didn't care that Jane was having a sexual relationship with Kelly at the time, because she was 17 years old by the time they talked to the grand jury. Bonjean said Jane's parents condoned the relationship at the time, but only now in hindsight believe it didn't look good.

Nonetheless, Bonjean stressed that neither Jane nor her mother testified that Kelly instructed them how to testify to the grand jury.

Bonjean called Kelly's relationship with accuser Jane and her family, "an inconvenient reality for the government." 

"Lives are complex and for all the fist pounding and the outrage, that family made a decision that they had to live with at that time," she said.