By Moboluwade Tobiloba
YouTube has permanently suspended the channels of R&B singer, R. Kelly, who was found guilty of sex offences last week.
The platform will no longer allow him to create any new channels in future.
YouTube has, however, not banned Kelly’s music. The platform will continue to offer the singer’s music catalogue on YouTube Music.
The YouTube channels RkellyTv (which had 3.5 million subscribers) and Rkellyvevo (which had 1.6 million subscribers) were removed following the citation of the violation of its terms of service on Tuesday, October 5.
Attempts to watch videos on the now-removed channels display a message that says, “This video is no longer available because the YouTube account associated with this video has been terminated.”
Kelly’s official accounts on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook also have recently been disabled.
The move to delete Kelly’s channels came eight days after a federal jury found him guilty of racketeering and eight charges of an anti-sex trafficking law.
The 54-year-old is set to be sentenced to 10 years imprisonment on May 4, 2022.
YouTube said it pulled down the channels linked to R. Kelly in accordance with its “creator responsibility guidelines” That policy prohibits “on- and/or off-platform behaviour that we may consider to be inappropriate,” including “intending to cause malicious harm to others” and “participating in abuse or violence, demonstrating cruelty, or participating in fraudulent/deceptive behaviour leading to real-world harm.”
Kelly was found guilty in New York federal court of leading a scheme to recruit women and girls for sex, following decades of women coming forward to accuse him of sex crimes.
In 2008, he was acquitted of child pornography charges on Illinois, where he is still facing additional charges.
Witnesses also recounted other alleged crimes by the singer, including that he locked a radio intern in a room where she passed out and he sexually assaulted her, videotaped a woman wiping faeces on her face as punishment for not following his rules, and knowingly gave multiple people herpes.
