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R Kelly has appealed to a New York court to overturn a 30-year racketeering sentence, served to him in 2022.

The R&B singer – whose full name is Robert Sylvester Kelly – was found guilty of racketeering and trafficking following a high-profile trial in New York in 2021.

It followed years of accusations throughout his career.

He was served an additional year in prison on charges relating to indecent images of children and child enticement in Chicago last year.

Kelly – who was not present at the appeal – alleges that prosecutors failed to prove their racketeering claim or that he violated several women.

He also says he was denied a fair trial because several jurors prejudged his guilt, his lawyer provided ineffective counsel, and the jury was “swamped” by excessive evidence of other alleged bad acts.

Kelly was defended in the appeal hearing by lawyer Jennifer Bonjean, who began by disputing the definition of a RICO enterprise (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) and whether there has to be anything inherently illegal about such an organisation.

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Speaking about Kelly’s team of staff, and whether they were aware of “what happened behind closed doors,” she said that while “there were rules and things, [the staff] did these anodyne tasks that were perhaps a little unusual, but not that put them on notice that what was happening behind closed doors was illegal”.

When asked about staff’s specific knowledge of the age of girls recruited to come and see Kelly backstage, Ms Bonjean said: “I do not believe there was any evidence that the employee would book travel for someone who was in fact under the age of consent.”

Kelly’s brief marriage to pop star Aaliyah

Representing the United States, assistant US attorney Kayla Bensing said Kelly “had a system in place that lured young people into his orbit, and then he took over their lives”.

She went on to describe women aged 16 or 17 invited by members of Kelly’s staff to come backstage, including one who she said was invited by Kelly’s bouncers to come backstage at a concert in Miami.

She said that was “three days after Kelly’s marriage to Aaliyah, in which he bribed a county official in order to hide or alleviate the consequences of illegal sexual activity”.

She also spoke about a former runner to Kelly, who described his girlfriends as “looking very young, specifically middle-aged teenagers”.

Ms Bensing also said there was evidence Kelly’s team knew he had been infected with herpes while having unprotected sex with his victims.

Claims of forced labour

She finally bought the claim of forced labour into the case, describing Kelly as “obtaining labour and services, here sex acts, through threats of serious harm or physical restraint against the victims”.

In her three-minute rebuttal of the argument, Ms Bonjean said the forced labour counts “were premised on a single act,” adding, “so unless the court is prepared to say that a single act of oral sex, even if it’s forced, frankly constitutes forced labour, that is just making federal law co-extensive with state law”.

She also said the government was taking the position that “a RICO enterprise cannot not be rooted in criminality,” which she described as “unique” and “not supported” by previous cases.

The judges will now consider the appeal, and will issue a written decision at a later date.

Under his current convictions, Kelly, who is 57, will not be eligible for release until he is 80 years old.

Kelly rose from poverty to become one of the world’s biggest R&B stars. He became known for chart-topping hits including I Believe I Can Fly, Bump ‘N’ Grind and Ignition.

Although abuse allegations began circulating in the 1990s, widespread outrage followed the #MeToo reckoning and the 2019 series Surviving R Kelly.

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GB News fined £100,000 by Ofcom over Rishi Sunak programme

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GB News fined £100,000 by Ofcom over Rishi Sunak programme

GB News has been fined £100,000 for breaking impartiality rules over a programme featuring Rishi Sunak, Ofcom has said.

It comes after the media watchdog announced in May that the show called People’s Forum: The Prime Minister had breached broadcasting guidelines.

The programme featured then prime minister Mr Sunak answering questions from a studio audience and a presenter.

GB News chief executive Angelos Frangopoulos said the fine was a “direct attack on free speech and journalism in the United Kingdom”.

“We believe these sanctions are unnecessary, unfair and unlawful,” he added.

The hour-long show, which aired on 12 February, prompted 547 complaints to Ofcom.

The regulator found earlier this year that while featuring Mr Sunak was fine in principle, “due weight” should have been given to an “appropriately wide range of significant views” other than the Conservatives.

Rishi Sunak in Chequers in October 2023. Pic: PA
Image:
Pic: PA

Ofcom said Mr Sunak “had a mostly uncontested platform to promote the policies and performance of his government in a period preceding a UK general election,” which it recorded as a breach of impartiality rules.

The watchdog said “given the seriousness and repeated nature of this breach,” it had imposed a £100,000 financial penalty.

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GB News was also directed to “broadcast a statement of our findings against it, on a date and in a form determined by us”.

The TV channel is challenging the breach decision by judicial review and Ofcom will not enforce the sanction decision until those proceedings are concluded.

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Mr Frangopoulos insisted the show featuring Mr Sunak “was an important piece of public interest programming”, and that “appropriate steps” were taken to ensure due impartiality.

He added: “It was designed to allow members of the public to put their own questions directly to leading politicians.

“GB News chooses to be regulated and we understand our obligations under the Code.

“But, equally, Ofcom is obliged by law to uphold freedom of expression and apply its rules fairly and lawfully.”

Ofcom previously found GB News violated due impartiality rules in March over five programmes that featured Tory MPs as presenters.

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Comedian Marcus Brigstocke reveals he was addicted to pornography

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Comedian Marcus Brigstocke reveals he was addicted to pornography

Comedian Marcus Brigstocke has revealed he became addicted to pornography and received help to overcome the issue.

The TV star discussed the issue on The Hidden 20% podcast, saying he became addicted after he had an affair which led to the end of his first marriage.

Brigstocke, who has regularly been a panellist on Have I Got News For You and featured in the film Love Actually, said the “shame” from his affair “led to a lot of very dysfunctional behaviour”.

He told the podcast: “I’d stayed sober from drugs, alcohol, and my compulsive eating disorder, but I had become addicted to porn.

“I really had no idea that I was addicted to it. I sort of thought I looked at a normal amount of porn. Well, the normal amount of porn today is not like a normal amount of porn… before the internet.”

Brigstocke, 51, told host Ben Branson that most porn addicts “were addicted from about the age of 11”, saying it “profoundly alters your brain chemistry”.

“There are so many people with different depths of addiction to porn and to online social media,” he added. “But porn is the most toxic.”

The comedian said he would watch porn “all night, for the entire night”, before he received help to end his addiction.

Read more from Sky News:
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Brigstocke is now married to comedian Rachel Parris and the couple host a podcast called How Was It For You?

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Keri Russell and Rufus Sewell talks nerves, fame, and The Diplomat

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Keri Russell and Rufus Sewell talks nerves, fame, and The Diplomat

Rufus Sewell may seem to perfectly personify calm and confident characters in the acting world, but he admits he still struggles with public speaking.

“There’s nothing more terrifying,” he tells Sky News. “I remember having to do a reading at a church when I was very young and I was so nervous. I was at drama school, so people knew I wanted to be an actor, and as I was walking up towards the lectern I heard someone say, ‘this will be good’, and I completely froze.”

After portraying Prince Andrew in Scoop, which told the story of the royal’s infamous Newsnight interview in 2019, the British actor can now be seen on screen playing political superstar Hal Wyler in the second series of The Diplomat.

 Rufus Sewell as Prince Andrew in the new Nextflix drama Scoop.
Pic: Netflix/PA
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Sewell also recently played Prince Andrew in Scoop. Pic: Netflix/PA

Despite his ability to inhabit his characters, both real and fictional, the “idea of speaking as myself” he says has always been “a horror”.

Even playing confident characters is nerve-wracking, he says, as it creates an internal battle between himself and the role. “I naturally, if left to my own devices, become very, very self-conscious, so I have to find ways to trick myself out of it.”

In The Diplomat, Sewell’s character is the estranged ex-husband of Kate Wyler, the US ambassador to the UK, played by Keri Russell.

Pic: Netflix
Image:
Pic: Netflix

She spends the first season navigating political minefields trying to prevent a war before it happens, after a British aircraft carrier is blown up off the coast of Iran.

The series ended on a cliffhanger that saw Hal and other political figures involved in a car explosion in London, and season two picks up following the threads of evidence left in the aftermath.

Russell credits the show’s creator, Deborah Cahn, with making the series such a thriller.

“That is the gold of our show, 100%,” she says. “She has this uncanny ability to portray political intrigue and the world of diplomacy, but also has this innate understanding of what makes people human and all the idiosyncratic weird things that make people normal.

“Even though they’re in this really seemingly powerful position, they still have bad days and are cranky, or get mad when their food is the wrong thing, or when they have to wear something they don’t like, and they still deal with all the embarrassments of daily life.”

Season two of The Diplomat out now on Netflix

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