New charge: R. Kelly tried to buy ‘fraudulent’ ID documents day before Aaliyah marriage
Prosecutors in New York City accused singer R. Kelly on Thursday of bribing an Illinois official to get fake identification documents that appear to be related to his 1994 marriage to 15-year-old singer Aaliyah.
A revised indictment in federal court in Brooklyn accuses Kelly of scheming with others to pay the Illinois official for a “fraudulent identification document” for someone identified only as “Jane Doe” on Aug.
30, 1994.
A day later, R. Kelly, then 27, married 15-year-old R&B singer Aaliyah D. Haughton in a secret ceremony arranged by Kelly at a hotel in Chicago. The marriage was annulled months later because of Haughton’s age.
The indictment didn’t identify the person who was paid the bribe in order to get the fake ID, except to say that the person was a public employee.
Defense attorney Douglas Anton on Thursday called the latest charge against his client “ridiculous and absurd.”
Kelly’s attorneys have long maintained that he was unaware of Aaliyah’s age when they married. The Illinois marriage license used for the wedding said she was 18.
The Brooklyn prosecutors had already charged R. Kelly with racketeering, kidnapping, forced labor and sexual exploitation. They alleged he and his employees and assistants picked out women and girls at concerts and groomed them for sexual abuse.
The 52-year-old singer, who is being held without bond, is scheduled to stand trial in federal court in Chicago in April on child pornography and obstruction of justice charges before facing trial in Brooklyn.