A Chicago judge refused to lower R. Kelly‘s child support payments on Wednesday, despite the disgraced singer’s requests.
Kelly has been dealing with tens of thousands of dollars in missed child support payments in addition to his ongoing sexual abuse scandals. The singer was sent to jail last week because of his overdue payments, which totaled over $161,000. On Wednesday, Kelly asked a judge to lower his monthly payment, but according to CBS News, they refused.
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Kelly reportedly owes a stipend of $21,000 to his ex-wife, Andrea Lee Kelly. The singer claims that he can no longer afford the sum — not least of all because of the recent dip in his social standing. However, a Cook County judge was not convinced, and wanted Kelly’s child support to remain the same.
“If you can’t play a show, if you can’t go out on tour, if they’re not streaming your music anymore, obviously you’re going to have financial problems,” said Kelly’s lawyer, Steve Greenberg. “You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure that out.”
Even last week, Kelly was not able to pay the child support himself to get out of jail. An anonymous person reportedly gave him the cash as a gift to buy his freedom. Kelly was taken to jail last Wednesday and released on Saturday.
“I promise, we will straighten this out,” Kelly told reporters at the time. “That is all I can say right now.”
Kelly’s publicist, Darryll Johnson, has also painted a dire picture for the embattled singer. He told reporters that Kelly has no assets to sell. He said that Kelly does not even own his apartment in Chicago’s Trump Tower but merely paid lots of rent in advance several years ago. Johnson claimed that he and Kelly’s attorneys were all working for free for now.
Kelly reportedly stopped making his court-mandated child support payments last spring. Greenberg claimed that he was already looking for ways to reduce them before he was arrested last week.
Kelly is due back in court to re-evaluate his child support on May 8. In the meantime, his separate criminal cases are all moving forward. Kelly continues to deny any wrongdoing whatsoever in the various sexual assault and child abuse cases against him. In his explosive interview with CBS’ Gayle King, Kelly claimed that every single one of the women accusing him and the people defending them were lying.
“I didn’t do this stuff! This is not me,” Kelly said at the time. “I am fighting for my f—ing life!”
