American R&B singer, Robert Sylvester Kelly, popularly known as R. Kelly, has filed a petition asking President Donald Trump to commute his combined 31-year federal prison sentence, and his legal team has also sought a presidential pardon after previous appeals and an emergency motion for release were denied.
The 58-year-old singer, born Robert Kelly, has filed a petition for clemency with the Department of Justice, according to records reviewed by USA TODAY. He is currently serving time behind bars in North Carolina for his 2021 and 2022 convictions on charges of racketeering, sex trafficking, child pornography and enticement.
Kelly was sentenced to 30 years in federal court in New York in the first case and 20 years in federal court in Chicago in the second. Under the terms of the Chicago sentence, he will serve one additional year after completing the New York sentence, with the remainder running concurrently, leaving him with a combined 31-year prison term.
After his weekslong trial in Brooklyn in 2021, Kelly was found guilty of leading a criminal enterprise from 1994 to 2018, comprised of employees who helped recruit women and underage girls to engage in illegal sexual activity and produce pornography, at times crossing state lines to do so.
Additionally, he was accused of bribery, kidnapping, forced labour, producing child pornography and knowingly infecting some victims with a sexually transmitted disease.
Kelly’s 2022 Chicago case also ended with a guilty verdict on three counts of child pornography and three counts of child enticement.
The former R&B superstar, who has repeatedly denied the allegations, moved to reverse the 2021 convictions in 2024, but a New York appeals court denied the request the following year.
In June 2025, Kelly’s legal team filed an emergency motion for him to be released from federal prison and transferred to home confinement, alleging three Bureau of Prisons officials orchestrated a plot for an inmate to kill the singer. The filing further alleged guards gave him an overdose quantity of medication and went against medical advice by removing him from a hospital stay where he was being treated for blood clots.
Kelly’s attorney, Beau B Brindley, wrote in a statement at the time that federal officers had solicited the murder of R Kelly because he intends to expose the corruption underlying his federal prosecutions. He said they had filed their motion to make sure that they fail, adding that the only thing that can protect Mr Kelly behind the prison walls now is the fact that the world is watching.
A judge denied the motion days later. That same month, Brindley told USA TODAY that the “Ignition” hitmaker’s legal team was seeking a pardon from President Trump, who the attorney said is the only person with the courage and the power to fight corruption in the prosecution of public figures and stomp it out.
