R. Kelly

another woman from R. Kelly's "cult" speaks out

Following an extensive report detailing allegations against R Kelly, including that he’s holding several women in an “abusive cult,” another woman who claims to have been involved with Kelly has spoken out. Jezebel spoke with a woman they refer to by the pseudonym Kim. As someone without music industry aspirations who was also a few years older than many of the women surrounding Kelly, Kim’s experiences seem, at the outset, slightly different than the allegations in the report. She didn’t leave her home and family to live with Kelly, instead flying out to see him several times over the past year. Nor did she partake of the MDMA that she says was “constantly on offer.” However, many of the details she provides of her experiences with Kelly seem to confirm the allegations.

Kim, who is in her mid-20s, told Jezebel that she likes having sex with powerful men and enjoyed partying with Kelly and his crew. “I knew what I was getting myself into,” she said. The other girls around Kelly, however, seemed more star-struck to her and appeared to depend on the singer’s approval.

“All these girls just dote on him,” she said. “It’s so fucked up. They’re completely manipulated and brainwashed.”

Kim goes on to describe the level of control Kelly exerts over the women who surround them, including in their interactions with each other.

Kelly…forbids the girls to compliment each other on their dresses, Kim said, because that’s too close to complimenting them on their figures. One day, she recalled, they were at lunch, sitting at a sidewalk table outside. A woman walked by whose dress Kim admired. “I was looking at her and he kicked my chair because I was looking up. Just super possessive. It’s a strange kind of dynamic.”

The women are also strictly kept from knowing too much about each other, Kim says. “We’re not allowed to talk about anything. We can compliment shoes or nail polish or make small talk about the weather but we can’t talk about any personal details.”

Kim also recounts a disturbing punishment one of the women was subjected to.

Kim said that she and the girl were instructed by Kelly to “take off your clothes and act like you miss each other.” He got out his iPad and started filming, she said, but was dissatisfied by the 19-year-old’s performance. He told Kim to sit on the couch and took the 19-year-old into another room. Twenty minutes later, he called Kim in. Kim knocked in the proper way, then walked in to find the younger girl nude except for one of Kelly’s bigger pieces of jewelry, a heavy chain.

“He had his iPad recording and she was naked except for a big chain and she was running laps from one end of the room to the other,” Kim remembers. “She was running laps around the room and apologizing. She kept saying, ‘I’ve been bad, I’m sorry Daddy,’ shit like that. And I’m standing there and she starts apologizing to me.”

Kim said she told her it was all right, but Kelly cut her off. The younger girl continued in tears, she said, telling her, “I know I have to do what Daddy says, I have to act like I miss you more, I wasn’t getting into it.”

According to Kim, Kelly has a favorite among the women, also described in the Buzzfeed report as his “Number One girl.”

Kim said that Kelly’s clear favorite among the women she saw is one who turned 18 around December. “She’s apparently been with him since she was 14 or 15. He was telling me that he ‘raised her.’ Those were his words.”

There’s also an online petition calling on Sony Records to drop Kelly, citing these most recent allegations along with past ones, like his 2002 indictment on child pornography charges (he was later acquitted) and his numerous out-of-court settlements.

Kelly denied the allegations against him in a statement through his lawyer.

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