R. Kelly loses civil court case after missing hearing

Authored by bbc.com and submitted by lurker_101
image for R. Kelly loses civil court case after missing hearing

Image copyright Reuters Image caption R. Kelly outside court after a hearing in his criminal case on 22 March

Singer R. Kelly has lost a civil court case by default after failing to respond to a legal case brought by a woman who accused him of sexual abuse.

He failed to turn up at a court in Chicago, leading a judge to pass the ruling against him.

The woman, identified only as HW, accused Kelly of repeatedly having sex with her when she was a minor.

She is also one of four accusers in a separate criminal case. He has pleaded not guilty and denied any wrongdoing.

In her civil lawsuit, HW claimed the R&B singer initiated a sexual relationship with her 20 years ago when she was 16. The age of consent in Illinois is 17.

The judge will determine how much Kelly should pay in damages next month.

The victim sued the singer in February, a day before Kelly was arrested on 10 charges of sexual abuse.

Lawyer Steve Greenberg, who is representing Kelly in the criminal case, said he was not involved in the civil litigation and declined to comment.

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nobombsonlyblastmask on April 26th, 2019 at 06:09 UTC »

Man and they laughed when sir mix a lot lost all his money. Dude is on 5 days a week on my local radio station. He’s a good guy who never pissed into any little girls mouths

mgraunk on April 26th, 2019 at 02:23 UTC »

Well if he knew he was gonna lose anyway, this is probably the best thing he could have done. Now he can deny he was guilty and his idiotic "R. Kelly did nothing wrong" fans will eat it up. He can forever claim that the only reason he was found guilty was that he didn't show up to court.

JohnGillnitz on April 26th, 2019 at 01:55 UTC »

Dude is broke and is going to spend the rest of his life in jail.