Pitchfork

So that's that for the big R. Kelly trial. According to a Chicago Tribune report, a Cook County jury this afternoon acquitted Robert Kelly, finding the r&b megastar not guilty on 14 counts of child pornography.

Those charges stem from a video tape that surfaced in 2002, one which depicts a man thought to be Kelly engaged in various sex acts with a young girl-- allegedly Kelly's goddaughter-- thought to be as young as 13 at the time. After making headline news all those years ago, the case finally went to court early last month.

As neither Kelly nor the girl thought to be on the tape gave testimony, prosecutors instead relied on testimony from acquaintances of the two in an attempt to paint the relationship between Kelly and his goddaughter as a less than savory one.

Kelly's defense, meanwhile, sought to establish that the man in the tape was not in fact the singer, and that the girl was actually a prostitute and not his goddaughter. The crux of their argument surrounded a mole that appears on Kelly's back but, they argued, does not appear on the back of the man in the video. Both Kelly and the girl in question long denied being on the tape.

After seven and a half hours of deliberation today, the jury reached its verdict. And there you go.

Officially a free man, R. Kelly plans to drop a new album, 12 Play: Fourth Quarter, this summer.