In a case that has been a saga of delays and false starts, R. Kelly’s trial was postponed yet again on Tuesday, with no trial date in sight more than five years after child pornography charges were filed against the R&B singer.
The lead prosecutor in the case, Assistant State’s Atty. Shauna Boliker, gave birth last week, prompting the judge presiding over the case to indefinitely postpone the trial less than two weeks before its scheduled start on Sept. 17.
A spokesman for Cook County Circuit Judge Vincent Gaughan cited doctor’s orders in announcing the decision, a move that has added a familiar air of uncertainty to the case.
This was the closest that the trial had come to starting. But it was no secret that Boliker was scheduled to deliver a baby last week, which had led to speculation at the courthouse that the Sept. 17 date was unrealistic.
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Kelly, 40, was indicted in June 2002 on child pornography charges. Officials say he videotaped himself having sex with a girl whom prosecutors say may have been as young as 13.
In the more than five years since he was charged, Kelly’s career and popularity have soared. He has produced several hit CDs, gone on tour and recently released the latest installments of his highly successful video serial “Trapped in the Closet.”
Gaughan has issued a gag order that bars the prosecution and the defense from talking about the case.
The snail’s pace of the criminal case against Kelly may shake some people’s confidence in the ability of the courts to deal efficiently with cases involving wealthy defendants, legal experts said. But they also say the delay didn’t prejudice Kelly’s rights and may have been hard to avoid.
The case has been beset with a wide range of problems, but neither side has consistently been dragging its feet, the experts said.
Many of those problems had no easy solutions. For example, there were lengthy delays caused by defense lawyer Ed Genson’s commitments to other clients, including former Gov. George Ryan and former media magnate Conrad Black, both of whom were involved with lengthy federal trials.
But forcing Kelly to choose another lawyer would have risked reversal on appeal.
“It’s better to try these cases once and have confidence in the outcome, than to press forward and [create] potential error,” said Mark Rotert, a former federal and state prosecutor now in private practice.
In Kelly’s case, the reasons for the holdups have ranged from the routine to the peculiar. Kelly’s legal “dream team” — including Genson, Sam Adam and Eugene Pincham — has filed numerous pretrial motions, some seeking to dismiss the charges, including challenging the constitutionality of one of the state’s child pornography laws. There also have been lengthy arguments over the time frame in which officials said the tape was made.
In addition, on three occasions, prosecutors have sought to ban the videotape from public viewing during the trial. Each time, Gaughan has ruled the tape would be shown publicly in the courtroom.
And then there was a series of health setbacks: Gaughan fell from an 18-foot ladder and broke several bones, while Kelly had emergency surgery after his appendix burst.
All have combined to make the case chug along at a snail’s pace.
While it is not unheard of for cases at the Criminal Courts Buildings to drag on for this long, those often are more complicated murder cases.
“When something slips for five years, neither party, in my judgment, wants to see this case go to trial,” said Steven Miller, a former federal prosecutor now in private practice.
Miller said it was much easier to see why the defense might prefer the case to move slowly, since Kelly could continue to work and make money in the interim.
But “criminal cases, unlike wine, rarely get better with age, if you’re the prosecution,” Miller said. “So the prosecution typically wants to move a case along expeditiously.”
The prosecution in the Kelly case face some significant hurdles. The girl said to be depicted in the sex tape by prosecutors has consistently denied it is her. The prosecution has said it won’t call her as a witness, instead relying on relatives and friends to identify her on the tape.
Richard Kling, a defense lawyer and professor at Chicago-Kent College of Law, said the delays won’t change the key piece of evidence in the case, though. “The video is the video,” he said.
Kling said the problem with the delays might be more perception than reality.
“I think the biggest downside here is that it gives the perception that if you’ve got money, you can indefinitely buy your way out of possible conviction,” Kling said.
Criminal defendants can demand a speedy trial and go to trial within months. But most do not, seeking more time to prepare their cases or work a deal.
The judge also can use their scheduling power to move things along. But it’s easier for a judge to apply pressure if there’s one side that is dragging its feet and the other side is complaining, experts said.
When the slowdowns come from every angle — defense lawyer obligations, the judge’s schedule and a prosecutor’s medical leave — it’s harder to crack down.
And some experts said the postponements don’t add that much relative to the main costs of the case.
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“I don’t think the taxpayers are taking a beating in this,” Rotert said.
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