R Kelly’s former manager found guilty of threatening cinema screening of ‘Surviving R Kelly’ documentary

completemusicupdate.com:

R Kelly’s former manager Donnell Russell was found guilty on Friday of threatening physical harm by interstate communication in relation to a phone call he made to a New York cinema in late 2018 in a successful bid to stop a screening of the documentary ‘Surviving R Kelly’.

The guilty verdict came at the end of a short trial that began last week in the New York courts.The December 2018 screening at the NeueHouse Madison Square complex was called off after an anonymous man made phone calls to both emergency services and the cinema itself to the effect that he would “shoot up the place” if the film was shown.

Several of the women who had made allegations of abuse against Kelly were in attendance at the screening, which was due to be followed up by a panel discussion.Russell had earlier in the day tried to get the screening cancelled on legal grounds, before opting to simply make threats of violence against the cinema.

In court last week, his lawyer conceded that his client had indeed made the earlier calls making the legal threats, but argued that there was no solid evidence that he had followed up with the threats of violence.According to Courthouse News, Russell’s defence lawyer stated that the person at the cinema who had received the calls said that the voice threatening violence was different to that which had made the legal claims earlier in the day, and that it sounded like the latter call was being made from the street on a mobile.And yet, the defence added, the prosecution claimed that Russell made all the calls, and from a landline.