R. Kelly Reportedly In Solitary Confinement For Having Retired Warden’s Phone Number

"His only reason for having the phone number or contact with that prison official is because he was involved in a mentor program at the jail," Kelly's attorney told People.

R. Kelly’s time in prison just got a lot harder. The disgraced singer was placed in solitary confinement after officials learned he had a former warden’s phone number.

According to his attorney, Beau Brindley, the incarcerated singer, born Robert Sylvester Kelly, was placed in isolation at the Federal Correctional Institution in Butner, North Carolina, after officials said he had a retired warden’s phone number in his cell, TMZ reports.

R. Kelly will reportedly remain in solitary confinement while the investigation continues.

The situation started when R. Kelly’s cellmate was caught with a contraband cellphone. Brindley said officers then searched the shared cell and discovered a notebook belonging to R. Kelly that contained the retired warden’s phone number.

Prison officials then moved R. Kelly to the Special Housing Unit (SHU) while they investigate how the former warden’s number ended up in his possession, according to his attorney.

“For privacy, safety, and security reasons, we do not discuss the conditions of confinement or internal security procedures for any inmate or group of inmates,” a rep for the federal Bureau of Prisons said.

Brindley said R. Kelly was participating in a mentoring program for inmates at FCI Butner Medium I, overseen by the warden, and that the retired warden had given him R. Kelly’s phone number so he could reach out for guidance on the program.

“His only reason for having the phone number or contact with that prison official is because he was involved in a mentor program at the jail,” Brindley said, according to People. “And so he’s involved in a mentor program, and because of that, he has a relationship with the prison official. That official retired and left the phone number for Mr. Kelly, and then, as a result of that, now Mr. Kelly’s locked up in special housing, for what they call an investigation.”

Brindley said it’s unclear how long the investigation, or R. Kelly’s stay in isolation, will last, adding that the experience has been “devastating” for his client.

“They will not give us that timeframe, so we don’t know. We’re trying as hard as we can to make it as short as possible, but we don’t know how long he’s going to be held in there on this, unfortunately,” Brindley said.

R. Kelly is serving a 30-year federal sentence following convictions in New York and Chicago between 2021 and 2022 on charges including racketeering, sex trafficking, and child pornography.

He was transferred to the Federal Correctional Institution in Butner, North Carolina, in April 2023 after beginning his sentence at Chicago’s Metropolitan Correctional Center earlier that year.