R. Kelly Rung Up on Porn Charges

The Grammy-winning R&B star was arrested in Florida on Wednesday, hours after a grand jury in Chicago indicted him on 21 counts of child pornography.

A warrant had been issued for Kelly's arrest shortly after the indictment was filed, and the singer was apprehended in Polk County, Florida. No other details have been disclosed, and it is not known when Kelly will be taken back to Chicago.

The grand jury decision comes three months after a graphic videotape surfaced purportedly showing the singer having sex with a teen girl.

In a press conference, Terry Hilliard, the superintendent of the Chicago Police Department, announced that the charges were brought after the FBI determined the tape was not a forgery, and investigators interviewed several witnesses who identified both Kelly, 35, and the girl, who was born in 1984. Investigators say the tape was shot sometime between February 1997 and the beginning of this year in a home Kelly once owned in Chicago.

"Make no mistake--these are very harmful crimes," Hilliard told reporters. "The nature of these indictments returned today should also make parents more vigilant. These acts are serious crimes that involve harmful acts which damage and degrade our children, and are diminishing the integrity of our entire community."

The felony charges carry a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison and a fine of up to $100,000. If convicted, Kelly (whose first name is Robert) would also have to register as a sex offender.

Hilliard also gave a stern reminder to those selling and/or buying the videotape that it's against the law to possess child pornography.

When asked why underage-sex charges weren't filed against Kelly, Cook County State's Attorney Richard Devine said, "We brought the charges we thought appropriate at this stage."

Faced with a litany of criminal charges and a burgeoning scandal that has already hurt his career, Kelly released a statement through his publicist vehemently proclaiming his innocence.

"Even though I don't believe any of these charges are warranted, I'm grateful that I will have a chance to establish the truth about me in a court of law. I have complete faith in our system of justice, and I am confident that when all the facts come out, people will see that I'm no criminal," said Kelly.

The Kelly sex tape controversy began in February, when the Chicago Sun-Times anonymously received a video allegedly showing Kelly committing lewd acts with the unidentified teen girl. (Sparkle, the performer who collaborated with Kelly on the 1998 tune "Be Careful," later told a Los Angeles radio station that it was her niece with Kelly.) The paper handed the video over to the police, who launched an investigation culminating in today's indictment.

The now infamous tape--which has already hit the streets and the Internet under the title R. Kelly Triple-X-- also allegedly contains scenes of graphic sexual encounters between the singer and other women.

One of those women, Montina Wood, a 33-year-old dancer who once toured with Kelly, filed an invasion or privacy lawsuit against him on Tuesday, claiming he secretly taped their sessions of her dancing nude and performing sex acts on him and then allowed copies to be distributed without her consent.

Kelly has already settled two other civil suits brought by underage girls who accused him of coercing them into sex. However, he denied having any relationship with either.

He's also fighting a similar suit brought in April by a woman who claims Kelly seduced her when she was 16, got her pregnant and forced her to have an abortion.

Kelly is no stranger to such allegations. In 1994, he secretly married a teenage Aaliyah when he was in his 20s. When the late singer's parents found out about the marriage, it was quickly annulled and both artists subsequently refused to comment on it.

Chicago police began probing Kelly as far back as December 2000 after hearing of the singer's alleged relationship with a teen girl. However, they failed to find any proof--until the videotape came out.

Kelly, whose hits include the G-rated paen to basketball, "I Believe I Can Fly," as well as raunchier tunes like "Feelin' On Yo Booty," "Your Body's Callin'," "Bump n' Grind" and "Sex Me," has found himself dissed by both fans and fellow artists in the wake of the scandal.

His latest album, a collaboration with Jay-Z titled The Best of Both Worlds that was expected to be one of the year's biggest albums, has been underperfoming. Not only did Def Jam decide not put the artists' faces on the album cover, the label has scuttled plans for a video and tour.

R&B newcomer Ashanti decided against a duet with Kelly on her monster-selling debut album, and opted to perform with Ja Rule instead.

And Kelly has also been the subject of a nationwide boycott by several radio stations and family-centric groups, some of which have staged record-smashing demonstrations.

In an interview on BET last month, Kelly insisted he wasn't the man in the tape (even though he also said he never saw the tape).

"I want America to know that you can't believe everything you hear, and nowadays, you can't believe everything you see," he said. "I've done a lot of wrong things in my life, but I'm not a criminal. I'm not a monster."

Kelly is married to one of his former concert dancers. The couple have a newborn son and two young daughters.

(Originally published at 2:35 p.m. PT)