R. Kelly, Jackson Cases Reflect Victim Bias

ByABC News
May 4, 2004, 12:00 PM

May 20, 2004 -- Given the criminal charges against them, the careers of both R. Kelly and Michael Jackson should both be on life-support. So why is Kelly still able to fly?

In an alleged child molestation case involving a now-14-year-old boy, Jackson, 45, faces 10 charges that include: felony conspiracy, committing lewd acts upon a child, attempting to commit a lewd act, and administrating an intoxicating agent to a child. Kelly faces child pornography charges in Illinois, and the tape at the center of the case allegedly shows the 37-year-old singer having sex with a female who, according to Chicago police, was 14 at the time.

Kelly whose birth name is Robert Sylvester Kelly originally faced 21 charges in the case but prosecutors dropped seven counts of soliciting a minor to appear in a pornographic video. Kelly had also faced multiple child porn counts in Florida for photos allegedly showing him having sex with the same underage girl.

But a judge threw out that case in March when he found that investigators had illegally seized the material from Kelly's home. Before his most recent scandals, Kelly also had settled two lawsuits from women who claimed he had coerced them into sex when they were underage, but maintained his innocence.

Both Jackson and Kelly have pleaded innocent in their cases and denied any wrongdoing. These scandals could have ruined the careers of both performers, but they haven't. Only Jackson's career has suffered, while Kelly's continues to soar.

Acceptable Victims?

So why has Kelly appeared to shrug off scandal? The answer, in part, may lie in his alleged victims and the way sex-crime victims are sometimes perceived. A sex crime involving a male alleged perpetrator and a female especially if the victim is a teenager, not a younger child may be seen as more "acceptable" than a man-on-boy case.