R. Kelly To Finally Face Child Pornography Charges

Another sad example of the state of our criminal justice system. Five years after being charged with child pornography, R&B singer and pedophile R. Kelly is finally going to court:

CHICAGO -- R. Kelly will go on trial next month, more than five years after he was charged with child pornography.

Judge Vincent Gaughan has set a Sept. 17 date for the start of a jury trial, according to the Cook County state's attorney's office.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported on its Web site that setting of the date followed a lengthy meeting Wednesday among the judge, the lead prosecutor, the R&B singer and his lawyers.

Kelly, who was born Robert Sylvester Kelly, has pleaded not guilty to 14 counts of child pornography. He was charged in 2002 and is accused of allegedly engaging in videotaped sex acts with an underage girl.

Kelly's attorneys haven't conceded that he is on the tape, saying his likeness may have been computer generated. They have also tried to raise doubts about the identity and age of the girl.

R. Kelly is a musical genius, but one very, very sick man. He deserves to be locked up because anyone's whose seen the infamous tape of him having sex with a 14-year-old girl knows that the guy on the tape is him. Plus, who can forget the fact that he tried to marry late R&B singer Aaliyah when she was only 16? Yet, somehow I doubt that Kelly will do much time in the pen due to his celebrity status (which could perhaps lead to some kind of plea deal) and the fact this case has taken so long to go to court you just know key witnesses testimony is going to be pretty murky at best and his lawyers will pounce on inconsistent statements. Of course, if this trial does go all the way through, it has a good chance of being more scandalous than Michael Jackson's child molestation trial back in 2005 and whose to say that's a good thing?