Chicago- A Cook County jury Friday acquitted R&B superstar R. Kelly of child pornography charges, marking the end of a high-profile trial rich in courtroom drama and celebrity intrigue.

Jurors put little stock in the prosecution’s star witness, a woman who claimed she participated in sex acts with Kelly and the underage girl. And because the alleged victim and her family denied she was the woman in the video, jurors’ sense of reasonable doubt held strong; likewise, the videotape of the sex acts was convincing, but didn’t conclusively prove illegal activity, jurors said.

The initial vote after the case went to the jury was 10-2 in favor of acquittal. Subsequent votes during “heated but civil” deliberations moved back and forth, but never very far. A white female juror said the jurors shared opinions, but never saw anything conclusive.

“And at some point we said there was a lack of evidence,” the woman said. “There was nothing concrete enough to say it was him or her on that tape.”

The 41-year-old singer, whose real name is Robert Kelly, long denied charges that he videotaped himself engaging in a variety of sex acts with his then-underage goddaughter. Authorities said the female in the video could have been as young as 13 at the time.

The jury of nine men and three women deliberated for 7 ½ hours before finding Kelly not guilty on all 14 counts.

“R. Kelly was found not guilty because they had the best jury that Cook County could produce,” said Kelly’s attorney Sam Adam Jr. “Two things happened today. R. Kelly got his name back, and [his goddaughter] never had to lose hers.”

Prosecutors struck a somber note about a case that has lasted more than six years, using their statements to thank witnesses, profess faith in their case and acknowledge they had an uphill fight to prove it.

“As we must, we accept the verdict of the jury in this case,” said Cook County State’s Atty. Richard Devine. “This prosecution is one we have no reservations about.”

Child pornography prosecutions can be extremely difficult in many ways—one of them being that victims often don’t come forward themselves, Devine said.

Even so, he said, charges “have to be brought.”

Shauna Boliker, lead prosecutor in the case, reserved her comments to thanking witnesses who came forward. “It was a difficult thing for them to do, but they did it very eloquently and courageously,” she said.

In the moments before the verdict was announced, Kelly could be seen praying in the courtroom. As the verdicts rolled in, each count not guilty, Adam said he heard Kelly saying, “Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus.”

News of the verdict spread like wildfire through the courthouse, as reporters ran from the overflow courtroom to call in dispatches and deputies sent out word over their radios. Some in the crowd outside the overflow courtroom, which included assistant state’s attorneys and other court personnel, openly sighed in disbelief. A few clerks who peeked out of their offices to investigate the commotion cheered upon learning that the singer had been set free.

Kelly and his entourage made a swift exit from the building and were greeted by thunderous cheering on the courthouse steps.

Ieshi Agee, 25, stood with her three young boys, who cheered as Kelly walked out.

“I knew he wasn’t guilty!” Agee screamed.

Kelly left surrounded by his entourage, who kept reporters away from the singer and escorted him to a waiting sport-utility vehicle as some 50 supporters shouted to him. Though Kelly did not speak to reporters, he did salute and wave to fans.

Allan Mayer, a Kelly spokesman, said: “Robert has asked me to speak on his behalf for now. Robert has said all along that he believes in our system, and he believes in God. And that when all the facts came out in court, he’d be cleared of these terrible charges.

“He did not expect that it would take 6 ½ years. It’s been a terrible ordeal for him and his family, and at this point all he wants to do is move forward and try to put it behind him. He wants to thank his lawyers who defended him so brilliantly. He wants to thank his fans who stuck by him and supported him with such love.

“Most of all, he wants to thank God for giving him the strength to get through this. He’s going to have more to say about all of this very soon. But for right now, he’d be more inclined to be with his family, collect himself and get strong again. But we’ll be hearing from him soon about all of this.

“Again, he thanks everyone for their support, and he thanks our system of justice for seeing him through. And he thanks God for his strength and his love.”

The spokesman declined to take questions.

Kelly’s SUV drove to Douglas Park on the West Side, where a tour bus was waiting. There, Kelly, his entourage and his defense team exchanged hugs and handshakes.

Before entering the bus, Kelly shook hands with a woman who pulled up in a van and hugged several female fans, who had been screaming upon his arrival to the park. A few minutes later, he hopped out of the bus and into a sleek silver car, which raced away at the head of a small caravan.

The verdict ends a bizarre case that had languished for nearly six years. During almost four weeks of testimony, the jury heard about three-person sexual encounters and watched a sex tape in which the male participant is seen urinating on a female.

Neither the alleged victim, now 23, nor her parents testified. All three denied her involvement in the tape to a grand jury in 2002.

Without their cooperation, the prosecution used other witnesses to describe the relationship Kelly shared with his goddaughter—an aspiring rapper who witnesses said became a member of his entourage while in junior high school. She often visited him at his downtown recording studio or watched him play basketball at a West Side gym, they testified.

Only one witness testified to having direct knowledge of an inappropriate relationship between Kelly and the alleged victim. Lisa Van Allen told the jury she engaged in a series of sexual encounters with the singer and his goddaughter when the girl was a minor.

The defense tried to undermine Van Allen’s testimony by accusing her of concocting the story to extort money from Kelly. Van Allen, who lives in Georgia, called prosecutors with information about the case shortly after her fiance, Yul Brown, was arrested on guns and weapons charges.

Brown said the verdict left him speechless.

“It made me think of the O.J. trial,” he said. “She testified and there was an overwhelming amount of evidence so it’s just flabbergasting to me the way it unfolded.”

At trial, Brown was maligned by the defense for his criminal background and for allegedly attempting to extort Kelly to have Van Allen change her testimony. Defense attorneys even suggested Brown’s recent sentence for possession of a loaded AK-47 and drugs by a felon was reduced to probation because of his fiance’s testimony in the trial. Brown denied this.

“I’m not upset about the verdict, I just want people to remember it’s about children; it’s about an underage girl,” he said. He added that Van Allen was more shocked than upset about the verdict.

Kelly’s attorneys contended the young woman in the tape is not the alleged victim but a prostitute. They called three family members of the alleged victim who testified that they saw no resemblance between their relative and the female in the video.

Kelly also did not testify. Without testimony from him or his alleged victim, the singer’s attorneys built their case around a caterpillar-shape mole along his spine. They argued that the man in the recording has an unblemished back, meaning Kelly couldn’t be the man in the video.

If you don’t see the mole, the defense told the jury, then Kelly cannot be convicted.

Kelly’s attorneys also suggested the 27-minute tape had been doctored, going so far as to say someone could have edited the singer’s head onto another man’s body. A prosecution expert testified such editing trickery would take 44 years and still be obvious to viewers.

But it was not enough to convince the jury.

“All of us felt the grayness of the case,” said one white male juror.

Most thought it was probably R. Kelly in the video, said one 54-year-old male black juror. Many thought the girl in the video was underage. But there remained a doubt that she was the victim alleged by prosecutors, the juror said.

The jury spent time looking at facial profiles, still shots and comparing them to the alleged victim’s face. And the young woman’s silence all but ruled out a guilty verdict, the juror said.

“The victim didn’t show up,” he said. “Her parents didn’t. The family that did was split.”

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Before the trial, the 54-year-old juror said he knew of R. Kelly and one of his songs: “I Believe I Can Fly.”

When asked about his impression of Kelly now, the juror said he’d heard Kelly thanked God for the verdict.

“I hope he does thank God,” the juror said.

The defense team was ecstatic with the verdict, calling it a major victory for an innocent man.

Ed Genson, Kelly’s lead attorney, said he has “graduated from late middle age to senior citizen on this case. Now I am going to get a little sleep.” Sitting beside him at a table speaking to the media was Adam Jr., who traded compliments with Genson.

Adam said the entire case was won because of Genson and his legal strategy. Genson said Adam “gave one of the best closing arguments I have ever heard.” Genson called the legal team the best he has worked with in his legal career.

“The evidence won the case, and we put together the best trial team I have seen in 43 years of practicing law,” Genson said.

The drawn-out legal battle has not slowed Kelly’s career. He has released five albums and a greatest-hits collection since he was indicted in 2002. He also has completed several concert tours.

He looked relieved Friday, and wasn’t the only one. Looking tired and worn, another of the white male jurors declined to comment beyond an official statement delivered earlier. He had earlier been admonished for losing his temper at dinner Thursday night and smiling in court Friday.

“I really don’t want to get into it, guys. It was a long four weeks,” he said, voice shaking slightly. “I just want it to be past me, that’s all.”