The former manager of American musician, R. Kelly, Donnell Russell, has been sentenced to jail for stalking the singer’s sexual assault victims
Russell had earlier pleaded guilty to threatening, harassing, and intimidating Kelly’s victims during the singer’s trial.
The Chicago district attorney revealed in July that Donnell also threatened to release nude pictures of an unidentified victim if she continued to pursue her lawsuit against the singer.
The statement read in part, “Between November 2018 and February 2020, Russell, a self-described manager, advisor and friend of Kelly, used the mail, phones and the internet to harass and intimidate Jane Doe, a victim in the Kelly case, and her mother after Jane Doe filed a civil lawsuit against R. Kelly.
“Specifically, Russell threatened to reveal sexually explicit photographs of Jane Doe and to publicly reveal her sexual history if she did not withdraw her lawsuit against Kelly and ‘cease her participation and association with the organisers’ of a ‘negative campaign’ against Kelly.”
On Thursday, a federal judge in Brooklyn sentenced Russell to 20 months in prison following his guilty plea.
The US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Breon Peace, hailed the judgement and called the sentencing a “victory for crime victims.”
“The punishment meted out to the defendant today is a victory for crime victims, particularly those of sexual assault and abuse, who are often reluctant to come forward to law enforcement or pursue legal recourse, given the trauma and fear of retaliation associated with publicly discussing their experiences,” Peace said in the statement.
Born Robert Sylvester Kelly, the artiste was sentenced by a federal court seated in Brooklyn to 30 years in prison for recruiting and trapping teenagers and women for sex in June.
A New York jury also found him guilty of leading a decade-long sex crime ring, in September 2021.