Surviving R Kelly (2019) s01e03 Episode Script
Sex Tape Scandal
1 I was sickened by what I saw.
A lot of people saw that pee tape.
It was circulating in the streets.
I came across the one with me, him, and the 14-year-old.
My niece has the same hairstyle she had when she turned 14.
That was her, for sure.
And that was him, definitely.
Various sexual acts, including urination, oral sex.
For him to do that to her Oh, man.
I took it and he never noticed it was gone.
I just didn't know that there was a point in time (crying): where they were talk where they were talking about killing me.
I should have never introduced her to him.
(crying): I should have never introduced my family to him.
How dare you.
How dare you.
(sniffles) CRAIG WILLIAMS: There was a bedroom in the studio.
Girls everywhere.
15 to 17 to 18.
JOVANTE CUNNINGHAM: We were young.
We were naive.
We were easily influenced.
It wasn't just me that was young that he liked.
It wasn't a mistake with Aaliyah.
He's sleeping with this young girl.
GEM PRATTS: It's like, uh, cattle that has four acres and he's the only cattle to graze; it's easy pickins'.
This is somebody who's written this inspirational, motivational song.
It was just massive.
JAMILAH LEMIEUX: Can he really be the monster? There's no moral clock there, there's no gage.
I introduced my niece to Robert and I saw her in the studio by herself.
I would walk in like, "What you doing here?" LISA VAN ALLEN: Him and I both were actually having sex with her.
I was unaware, at that time, of how young she was.
She was actually 14.
When I figured out that I had had sex with a 14-year-old, um, it made me feel betrayed, because he lied to me and told me she was 16, which would have been close to my age.
And it also made me question his motives.
I mean, the fact that he lied about her age to me, told me that he obviously knew that wasn't okay for her to be younger.
It-it made me feel, like, sick to my stomach.
It made me feel disgusted.
I mean, my daughter is older than she is now.
We didn't have sex with her anymore after I found out that she was that much younger.
We had sex in his home twice.
I didn't see his wife at the house, but there was a-a situation, um, between me, him and the younger woman where he did tell me that his wife was upstairs when we were in the-- I call it the Colorado Room, the one with all the wood, where the infamous sex tape was filmed-- that room, when we were down there, one time, he did tell me that she was upstairs.
PRODUCER: The girls that were seeing the other side of him, did you notice them? Do you know how-- Were they young at that time? No.
He never brought any of them around me.
He was never abusive to anybody in front of me.
He was never a person that, you know, like, "Hey, do y'all hear that in the room next door? Is that fighting or something?" I mean, we have to be realistic about the story line, too.
Seeing some (bleep) like that, you-- we really are not gonna be together, because you're showing me up front who your monster is, so I think that he strategically did what he did with me.
He kept it away from me for a reason.
It's like sometimes I often wish I would have just known up front; I really do.
I wish that I would have been able to see the fullness of the monster I was dealing with because it probably would have saved me years and years of pain.
It would have saved me years of abuse.
It would have saved me years of being alienated from my family if I just would have known up front what the hell I'm dealing with.
LISA: When we first started having sex, Rob was behind the camera, and he pretty much would talk us through the motions.
He would never ask me if, um, it was okay to be filmed, but he never hid the camera or anything like that.
He would just pull-pull out his tripod and his camera.
And he had the whole thing, the lighting.
He'd set it up and he-he liked to-to have control of the situation because he would tell you what to do anyways when you were having sex.
When he would put the camera up, he'd just say, "Make sure you're sitting properly for the camera, you know, for whatever angle.
" And when he'd be done filming, he'd just put it in his bag.
It was 2000, around the same time when I did the "I Wish" video with him.
I was in the studio, I was in the room, and he left the bag in the room with me.
And I just happened to open the bag up, and I started popping the tapes in to see what was on them.
It was just a whole bunch of different tapes with him having sex with different young girls, I guess, and women.
But I came across the one with me, him and the 14-year-old.
I watched it and, as I fast-forwarded some, I'd see other scenes with just him and her, without me.
Her face, her chest, it's just, wherever it was going, he just was-- as if she was a toilet, he was just peeing.
You know, just letting it go wherever.
I thought it was gross and-and weird and, uh, belittling.
In regards to the tapes, Robert taping himself, he's always did that.
Robert recorded everything.
I mean, R.
Kelly tapes his sexual encounters.
And he watched his own movies.
Abusers often want trophies from their criminal acts, so people will take things and be able to place memories and place maybe even sexual feelings on trophies that they've taken.
And it's power play.
You get to actively replay the act.
And when that's not enough, then you make another tape.
LISA: When I saw it, you know, it upset me, and I didn't want him to have possession of the tape anymore, 'cause I was on it, and I took it and kept it on me, and when I got a chance to go back to my hotel room, I left it at my hotel room, and he never noticed it was gone.
I actually didn't hold onto the tape that long at all because I was afraid that he'd find out that I had it.
I had befriended a few of his other artists, and I actually asked one of them if they could hold the tape for me.
I remember the first time we were in Detroit and he came to me and he told me about the videotapes.
He'd say, uh, "Man, you got to help me, man.
"We got to pray, man, 'cause these videos, man, I can't stop taping myself, man, and" and so we prayed.
I was privy, and shown, um, videos while I was still employed and, you know, around, yes.
Um, I never saw the-the bag's videos, because I think I would've been like, "Man, what the hell are you doing?" You know? "What-what are you doing?" But yes, I-I did see several, several videos.
DEMETRIUS: You know, I didn't know what was ahead, with those tapes, but Robert did.
And he used to come to me and he used to talk to me about that.
He'd say, "Man, this is gonna get me in trouble, man.
"I can't seem to stop.
This is gonna destroy me.
" My name is Abdon Pallasch.
I was the legal affairs reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times.
Our rock critic, Jim DeRogatis, got a fax laying out that there was a relationship going on with R.
Kelly and an underage girl.
Jim's the one who really heard about the dynamic that was going on in which people in R.
Kelly's own circle were saying that there was an issue there where he was just hanging out with young girls.
And Jim had gotten word that some of these young women had actually filed suit against him.
You know, he approached me as the legal affairs reporter, you know, "Can we check this out?" And, you know, I went and started pulling lawsuits and, sure enough, there were some.
And they generally settled out of court.
But the allegations were pretty explosive.
We started uncovering a series of lawsuits that had been filed and settlements that had been reached with-with young women that claim that-that they had sex with R.
Kelly when they were underage.
Our first story ran December 21, 2000.
And it said that R.
Kelly had been sued by all these girls.
The suits, all added together, seemed to show a pattern of behavior of him going after very young girls for sexual relationships.
Immediately after our story ran, -we started getting calls.
-(phone ringing) Other girls who said this has happened to them, from girls who said it happened to their friends.
And we-we did follow-up interviews with as many of them as we could.
A lot of them were very reluctant and shy.
And a lot of times, they wouldn't want to have their names used or even have their full stories appear.
These confidential settlements, you know, if the girls go public, they-they lose the settlement.
You have to pay it back.
So there's a limit to how much more we're gonna get from-from people that had already been involved in-in those sort of suits.
LEMIEUX: These are five, six-figure settlements.
And so, there we see the beginning of an ecosystem, right? Like, there's a-- there's a system of protecting R.
Kelly from accountability.
They said they were minors.
-Mm-hmm.
-You settled out of court.
-Yeah.
-In this country, many people will assume that means you were guilty.
Why'd you settle? I really can't go into detail about that particular thing, because, when I filed the lawsuit, um, of course, I signed, uh, a piece of paper saying I couldn't discuss -those particular people in the situation.
-So there's a confidentiality -agreement after the fact.
-Exactly.
Exactly.
TARANA BURKE: The idea that R.
Kelly was using nondisclosure agreements to keep these young girls and their families quiet, that means that he is cognizant of the kind of things that he's doing and he's trying to protect himself on the front end.
And I think that this is the thing that makes him, to me, more the-- more of a predator.
LEMIEUX: You can get people to sign NDAs.
We can make people go away with a check.
We don't have to do this in court, in front of the cameras and in front of, you know, the paparazzi and the tabloids.
We can make these things go away.
His camp was very unhappy and pushed back hard and said it was all false.
But they couldn't point to any part of the story that was actually false, 'cause it was all taken from court documents.
LISA: At this point, there were tapes floating around.
I-I didn't want a sex tape of me floating around the Internet or on TV or anything, so the only thing I could think of doing at that point would be to, um, to see if Rob could figure out a way to get the tape back.
I actually ended up contacting Rob and told him that I had took the tape.
He flew me back up to Chicago.
I told him that they probably wouldn't just give it back to me, that they probably need something, or whatever, to get it back.
And so he arranged for them to be paid to get him back his tape.
He had them take lie detector tests, well, one of the guys, and me, and, uh, I passed, and the guy did not because he was lying, he said that he didn't make any copies, and he actually did.
So, um, he ended up giving, you know, like, a little payment for that copy and then he said, "When you bring the rest back, you'll get, you know, the rest of the money.
" Rob said $250,000 was what it was gonna be.
He actually gave the money to his accountant.
You know, he ended up getting the tape, uh, for Rob on the last, uh, visit that I went up there.
I just didn't know that there was a point in time where where they were talking where they were talking about killing me.
So we started doing the stories, and we'd heard that there was videotapes out there of R.
Kelly with the underage girls, and we'd let it be known that we'd be happy to, you know, get those tapes, if they could assist in our reporting.
One day, an anonymous video was-was dropped off in Jim's mailbox.
So this appeared to be R.
Kelly engaging in sex with an underage girl.
Tongues are really wagging, ears are really burning, because they're like, "Did you hear about this sex tape?" So that means everything else that we've been hearing, we knew it was true.
That set everything off.
MITCHELL: The newsroom was in an uproar.
The editors had to make a decision whether or not this was so important that we could sit and view a tape and to basically pursue a story that literally was based in pornography, child pornography.
So it was very easy to look at that videotape and believe that that was R.
Kelly on the tape and that the girl was underage.
She looked like a child.
I got to tell you, as a mother and as a grandmother and as a black woman, I was sickened by what I saw.
It contained very graphic, um hardcore porn.
If I could just be blunt.
Various sexual acts, including urination, oral sex, everything that you can name.
PALLASCH: There'd just be denial after denial from people in the community that knew R.
Kelly.
They'd just say, "Oh, it's all wrong, it's all wrong.
These are people out to get R.
Kelly.
" But, you know, you can't be dissuaded, you can't be, uh, intimidated out of these things.
We didn't let up our reporting at all.
We were made aware that there was a 14-year-old girl.
His bass player's daughter that he was, uh, having an-an, a sexual relationship with at that time we were doing the stories.
SPARKLE: Chicago Sun-Times contacted me and wanted me to come down to their offices to view tapes that possibly had, um, girls on it that I may have known.
On the tape, my niece has the same hairstyle she had when she turned 14.
That was her, for sure.
And that was him, definitely.
My name is Raven, and I was friends with the girl in the tape since 1997, junior high on.
We bonded over basketball.
She and I were the, you know, star basketball players of our junior high team.
We spent a lot of time together, both on and off the court.
Her personality was vibrant.
Always happy, always having a great time, the life of the party.
Just a really fun, wonderful person to be around.
JACQUES CONWAY: Oak Park is a small town, so you get to know people quite well.
As a coach, I saw her play from junior high up until she got on my team as a sophomore in high school.
Her parents were very responsible, like any family in Oak Park River Forest.
You know, two parents who worked, sent their kid to the same school they went to.
Very supportive of their kids' activities by attending those events.
GENGLER: R.
Kelly would come to some basketball games.
I would see him in the stands.
It almost seemed like a doting father when R.
Kelly would see her.
CONWAY: It was just strange for me, to see a-a grown man hanging out at a high school with high school girls.
SPARKLE: Like, you hear things, but to see it visually, and for her to be so young it (bleep) me up.
It really did-- like, it's over with, but it still haunts me.
You know? And I hate this (bleep), that it happened.
It shouldn't have happened.
I should have never introduced her to him.
I should have never introduced my family to him.
Like, how dare you.
How dare you.
SPARKLE: How dare you.
(sniffles) What the (bleep)? "What are you doing, Robert?" Like, I never thought he would do this (bleep) to my family.
I don't know how the Sun-Times got the tape.
Who dropped it off, who sent it, who threw it-- I-I have no idea.
There was a money transaction from Robert to my niece in the beginning of this videotape.
After the money transaction, then there was a transaction (laughs softly) if you understand what I'm saying.
A sexual transaction.
And I didn't need to see any more, 'cause I knew it was her.
PALLASCH: We were able to confirm it was indeed her at a time when she was 14.
R.
Kelly and an underage girl having sex.
Here, we have evidence of a felony.
Now, you don't want to become an arm of the prosecution.
Journalists are supposed to be separate and apart from that.
But if you find a body in the lobby of the Sun-Times, you call the police.
And we ultimately did.
Here was a child who was being used by a grown man for sexual gratification, and obviously, no one cared.
People knew what was going on at his, uh, residence.
They probably saw this girl in and out, but proving that was a different thing.
It was obvious she was young.
It was on tape.
Everybody saw it.
It shows you how rich and powerful men can get away with a lot of things.
But it also shows the power imbalance between the abuser and the victim, as well.
Ever since this-this tape thing, this rumor has come out, you know, there's been a whole lot of people, you know, uh, it's been a R.
Kelly Day, man.
It's been people trying to, you know, say this or say that, coming out of the woodwork for me, you know, just trying to get paid.
I'm not a monster that people, that people are saying I am, and, uh, if people out there have a tape of me, and they're saying it's with me and a young girl, a minor, then they're sadly mistaken or they're lying.
(film projector clicking) JOVANTE: In his mind, I think he believes some of his own sick lies.
In his mind, he didn't do it.
He has no level of personal accountability as it relates to his poor behavior.
His attempt to say it wasn't him is ridiculous.
At one point, he's having sex with this woman, and somebody is yelling from another room, you know, "R.
Kells, pick up the phone.
It's phone for you" and, like, yelling his name.
PALLASCH: Eventually, bootleg copies of the tape start showing up around the country.
People are watching it in clubs.
MITCHELL: This tape was duplicated and was for sale all over the South Side.
So you could drive up to a, one of these, uh, outdoor flea markets and get a tape of R.
Kelly-- allegedly R.
Kelly-- having sex with an underage girl.
This is before the whole advent of-of sex tapes, and I think the tape came on VHS.
As a matter of fact, it was a VHS tape.
That tape was rushed to me from Chicago.
I'm looking at this tape, I'm like, "Oh" Robert has a problem.
A lot of people saw that pee tape.
It was circulating in the streets, it was, like, a bootleg that went around.
I don't remember what I was thinking at that time, but I'm like, "How did he get away with this?" BURKE: When I think about this grown man urinating in the mouth of a child, and how degrading that is, when I first heard it, it just really concretized for me that this person is a monster.
The tape is incredibly graphic.
That makes it almost impossible-- or should have made it impossible-- for people to pretend that they did not know that this person had a thing for little girls.
It's strange.
You have R.
Kelly performing at the opening ceremonies of the Olympics at the same time that there was this sex tape.
So for R.
Kelly to be there, just speaks to how huge he was.
ANN POWERS: The story of sexual predation as an inconvenience in popular music is so old.
It's been going on for decades, centuries.
Nobody wants to give up the music they love and nobody wants to think badly of the artists they love.
And I think that happened with R.
Kelly.
SPARKLE: I was pissed.
I'm like, "Who would do this?" Not only was I pissed at Robert for filming this (bleep), I was pissed at the person who put this out, because I'm like, "Look, this is a little girl on this tape.
" "Why would y'all do that?" CONWAY: I was made aware by, uh, some students that there was a, a, uh, tape, a sex tape.
One of my basketball players with R.
Kelly.
Uh, and they were selling it on the West Side of Chicago.
My specialty was sex crimes against minors for the Oak Park Police Department, so I went to the West Side, got a copy of this tape.
And I actually saw it at the police station.
It was just very disheartening, it was very sad.
This was the first victim that I personally knew.
And so, it was very heart-- uh, heartfelt to-to experience this, to see it, and felt that something had to be done about it.
Watching the tape and just thinking about, you know, if that were me or if that were my daughter, it just, obviously, tears me apart.
I wouldn't want that to happen to any young lady who's still young, still figuring out life, just looking up to this person who's supposed to be somebody that you trust and that trust, obviously, being taken complete advantage of.
PRODUCER: When you found out about that tape, can you tell me how you found out about it? (quietly): It don't even matter.
It doesn't matter how I found out about that tape.
What matters is that it existed.
It doesn't matter.
Who cares? Should've never happened.
I love that baby.
Like she was mine.
That was my baby.
And for him to do that to her Man LISA: It was 2000.
I had just turned 20 years old.
I ended up, um, missing my period and I told Rob that I thought that I was pregnant.
And he asked me to, um, did I take a pregnancy test? I told him I did, and, um, after that, he asked me to get another test and then to take that one in front of him.
And I did that, and it came up positive.
And, um, he asked me what did I want to do, and I told him, "To get an abortion.
" He contacted his assistant and a week later, we went to Planned Parenthood and I had my abortion.
It kind of was, like, the only option to me because, um, I didn't really want to have a kid by him.
I was concerned with if it would be a girl, what I would have to deal with, so I knew she would get older at some point.
There were, there were things that I just had to think about in my mind, you know, "Okay, he did this "with someone else's, um, child, I mean, what would keep him from doing that to mine?" PRODUCER: What was he like as a father? Was he loving with your children? I think Robert loved our children the best way he knew how.
He didn't have a father figure in his life, so he really didn't know how to be a father.
He just knew how to provide.
MITCHELL: The thing about Andrea Kelly and him marrying her is that nobody saw her after that.
It was like she was locked up, uh, o-on their estate, and she wasn't allowed out.
There were stories about-- that even if they, she wanted to get her hair done, or get her makeup done, the people had to come to her, that she was not allowed to come out.
And so it was a real odd, strange situation.
People were wondering, especially journalists, why in the midst of all these allegations of him having sex with underage girls, number one, why would she marry him? And number two, was she really free to ever leave home? Was she a prisoner in her own home? Just, what that relationship was all about.
There was a lot of speculation about what was going on in the Kelly household.
ANDREA: I would always hear rumors about, "Oh, he's being sued by this person, and sued by that person" And it almost seemed like every other week, he was in the tabloids for something.
Another person's coming forward, and I'm thinking to myself, like, "When did you have time? Are there more--" like, "Do you have a doppelganger around here that I don't know about?" Like, "When do you have time "to go to the studio, play basketball, come abuse me, "be a dad-- when you wanted to-- "and then go destroy other people's lives, and still be on the road and shoot videos?" Like, it was just, my mind couldn't fathom, like, "How are you doing all this?" And why didn't I know anything about it? And I think the frustration set in because it then became very real to me: "Drea, the reason why you don't know and he's able to do it, because he has people helping him.
" BURKE: He had to have backup in order to continue this level of behavior that he had.
His predatory behavior was supported by the people around him, in his camp.
And also, it points, to me, to the person who understands that they're doing something wrong.
Right? That you know that you're doing something wrong if you have to create systems to protect yourself from being exposed.
PRODUCER: Did you ever meet his wife? Um, there were times where she'd be checking in to the same hotel as me at the same time.
She might be with his publicist, and I'd be with his assistant.
He kept us apart.
You have your team, you have your cover-up people.
You have lawyers settling claims out of court.
Not trying to be funny: you don't read and write well, so you're not booking flights.
Who's booking these flights? Who's-who's telling the driver to go pick people up? Who's getting these hotel rooms? He's not doing it on his own.
CRAIG: I tell you, I don't know if the music industry in all knew about what was going on with Rob, but I do know that around Rob's camp, everyone knew, and nothing was done.
And when you have those type of people who are your yes-men around you, uh, it will continue to happen.
And if it wasn't right, it was obviously buried so that the rest of the world didn't know about it.
DEMETRIUS: That's the way it was.
It was every day, you know? It's the same routine, because he can have his way.
We work for him, and this is what he wanted and so this is what we were supposed to get him.
If you're an adult who's around him and you're aware and you're not saying anything, you're just as sick as he is.
Please understand that.
It doesn't make you any better because you're not doing it.
If you're aware and you're not saying anything, you're just as sick.
LEMIEUX: You've had these relations with young girls.
There's a video.
We're not talking about rumors at this point, we're talking about something that we can watch, to this day.
So it feels like they're taking a stand against black girls.
It feels like they're taking a stance to say, "Protecting Robert Kelly and his ability to make music "and entertain fans means more than what he did in his private life with these little girls.
" (cheering) R.
Kelly has done a really good job at sort of spreading himself around musically.
So he's got these hypersexual songs like "Bump n' Grind," and then he's got the inspirational songs like "I Believe I Can Fly.
" And (scoffs) I mean, you know, how can the guy who made "I Believe I Can Fly," which is played on Sunday mornings in church, in many black churches, how can that guy be wrong? One young exec stated, "I don't care if that is him on that tape, because we can't afford to lose him.
" I was like, "Wow.
That's some serious (bleep).
" Can't afford to lose him, and you don't care if it is him on this tape, with a young girl.
I was like, "That shows what type of (scoffs) person you are.
" When someone like R.
Kelly gets in trouble, there-there's this knee-jerk instinct to protect him from "the system.
" From the hand of the law, from all these forces that are at play to make sure that black people-- black men in particular-- don't succeed.
We have to stand by him.
We have to take care of him.
But his crimes were against black women and girls.
And that was devastating for me, because at this point, we already knew, but now we know some more.
You know, that this Aaliyah thing was not a moment.
This wasn't, "Oh, my God, she was just so mature, she was just, I was just spellbound, there was just something about her.
" It wasn't just those rumors about Kenwood.
It's on tape, and it's disgusting.
And the tape is being distributed in-in barbershops and on porn sites and it's everywhere.
And people are still not willing to say "I can't do this with you anymore.
" I called my oldest brother and I told him that I just had seen a tape, and it showed our niece on it.
You know, I didn't want to bring it to my sister because I don't know how to bring this to her.
I couldn't really keep my head in the game at this point.
What mattered was me protecting my family or-or me protecting my niece.
You know what I mean? That's all that mattered to me.
And I was estranged from the family.
They felt like I was tarnishing the family's name.
Tarnishing the family name? No.
Robert tarnished the family's name by putting our niece, your daughter, out there like that.
He set out to destroy that family.
That's what I believe, in my heart.
I believe he tried to divide that family with his poor behavior.
Sparkle is my friend, she is my son's godmother.
She has been and is like a mother to me.
I have always been her little girl, and I will always be her little girl.
And I watched my friend give up her career to save her family.
Robert knows what he did.
He's not confused about what he did.
Once I came out publicly, yeah, there was a lot of blowback.
People were unbelieving, people thought I was hating.
People thought I was jealous.
People were still able to dismiss Sparkle because they felt like she's just trying to get money.
What happened to Sparkle is like, "You are messing with the money, "you are in violation, you are talking out of turn, and now we're gonna shut you down.
" It run the gamut of loaded and unloaded (bleep) that people were saying about me, to me, to-- about my family, you know, about my niece.
Her being a little fast girl, like, come on.
She's 14 years old.
The adult is supposed to know not to touch that.
GENGLER: I just remember being completely blown away, and for this to be happening not only with a high-profile person that you look up to and admire, but also somebody that you were very close with, and at the time, thought everything was fine.
I felt really upset because at the same time, I'm like, "Well, why wasn't I there for her? How did I not know? How could I have been there for her?" Thinking all these things that I could've done.
(film projector clicking) JOVANTE: He has no moral clock.
And I can only imagine what his wife and his children have endured and did endure.
I can only imagine.
I know what I've seen.
I can only imagine.
I can only imagine.
-ED GORDON: You also have a family.
-Yeah.
How are they dealing with this? You have two children.
Well, my wife is totally behind me, because she knows the truth, and-and she's in my corner.
ANDREA: He put me on the bus in the middle of the night, did not tell me why we're going, what we're going for.
He shipped me off to Florida, and I'm just staying in this house.
I don't know what's going on, I got security at the door, nobody's telling me anything, like, "Why are we here, why did we leave Illinois?" I'm pregnant, I'm supposed to be going to the doctor, at least once a week at this point.
I should not be traveling.
"What is going on?" No one would tell me anything.
I was just broken.
CRAIG: Behind the scenes, the allegations had come.
It was known this tape was there, prior.
It was obviously buried so that the rest of the world didn't know about it, until this tape and those allegations popped up.
He put me on the bus in the middle of the night, did not tell me why we're going, what we're going for.
He shipped me off to Florida, and I'm just staying in this house.
I don't know what's going on, I got security at the door, nobody's telling me anything, like, "Why are we here, why did we leave Illinois?" I'm pregnant.
I'm supposed to be going to the doctor, at least once a week at this point.
I should not be traveling.
"What is going on?" No one would tell me anything.
I was under so much stress that when I went to the ob-gyn, they couldn't find his heartbeat.
And I remember getting to the emergency room and my best friend Angie was with me and I just remember coming through the door and they had papers and signing and people were grabbing me and putting stuff in my arm and I'm like, "Wait, wait, wait, wait," like, "what are you guys doing?" And they're like, "We have to induce your labor right away, because we don't know if the baby's gonna make it.
" I just remember them laying me on the bed, and they were like, "We're gonna give you Pitocin, we're gonna get this going.
Come on, Mom.
" And I went through the labor, and I just remember falling so in love with Little Rob because he came here so strong, but I was in that much stress that it put my unborn child's life in jeopardy.
'Cause here I am, by myself in Florida.
I don't know anybody, I just have my best friend.
And they eventually, again, had to go through ten people to get him on the phone.
(sniffles) "Mr.
Kelly, do you know that they induced your wife's labor? Like, she just had Little Rob.
" (sniffles) He said he was coming back.
But again, I don't know where he is.
And I remember after having him, that's when that day happened.
MAN: Mr.
Kelly has been indicted.
There's been a warrant issued for his arrest, and the Chicago Police Department is currently seeking to arrest Mr.
Kelly.
RICHARD DEVINE: We charge that the acts took place in Kelly's home in Chicago.
These indictments, hopefully, will send a message to sexual predators that taking advantage of minors will not be tolerated and that there are severe penalties.
I'm sitting here with the baby, and then it comes across the screen, they're like, "R&B singer R.
Kelly has been arrested on child pornography," and I just remember my best friend was with me and she said she don't know what happened, but my body went limp, and she said she caught Little Rob before he hit the floor.
And I remember, like, a buzzing sound.
It almost felt like I couldn't hear.
And I saw the screen, and they showed his name and the police, and I just, I don't even remember a lot after that.
REPORTER: What about the child porn charges? (women shouting) CHANEY: The police found media of R.
Kelly with plenty of other young girls that appeared to be underage.
NEWSWOMAN: Kelly is accused of videotaping himself having sex with an underage girl.
Y'all need to leave him alone.
That's not R.
Kelly.
Women lined up to show support for R.
Kelly.
I love me some R.
Kelly.
JERHONDA: I went to his trial because I was a superfan at the time.
NORCOTT: At the courthouse, his eyes were always fixated on the young girls.
Do you like teenage girls? He invited me back to his mansion in Olympia Fields.
You know what you did.
And he told me to bring a bathing suit.
You know the turmoil you brought into my kids' life I was 14 years old.
and for that, you can go to hell.
A lot of people saw that pee tape.
It was circulating in the streets.
I came across the one with me, him, and the 14-year-old.
My niece has the same hairstyle she had when she turned 14.
That was her, for sure.
And that was him, definitely.
Various sexual acts, including urination, oral sex.
For him to do that to her Oh, man.
I took it and he never noticed it was gone.
I just didn't know that there was a point in time (crying): where they were talk where they were talking about killing me.
I should have never introduced her to him.
(crying): I should have never introduced my family to him.
How dare you.
How dare you.
(sniffles) CRAIG WILLIAMS: There was a bedroom in the studio.
Girls everywhere.
15 to 17 to 18.
JOVANTE CUNNINGHAM: We were young.
We were naive.
We were easily influenced.
It wasn't just me that was young that he liked.
It wasn't a mistake with Aaliyah.
He's sleeping with this young girl.
GEM PRATTS: It's like, uh, cattle that has four acres and he's the only cattle to graze; it's easy pickins'.
This is somebody who's written this inspirational, motivational song.
It was just massive.
JAMILAH LEMIEUX: Can he really be the monster? There's no moral clock there, there's no gage.
I introduced my niece to Robert and I saw her in the studio by herself.
I would walk in like, "What you doing here?" LISA VAN ALLEN: Him and I both were actually having sex with her.
I was unaware, at that time, of how young she was.
She was actually 14.
When I figured out that I had had sex with a 14-year-old, um, it made me feel betrayed, because he lied to me and told me she was 16, which would have been close to my age.
And it also made me question his motives.
I mean, the fact that he lied about her age to me, told me that he obviously knew that wasn't okay for her to be younger.
It-it made me feel, like, sick to my stomach.
It made me feel disgusted.
I mean, my daughter is older than she is now.
We didn't have sex with her anymore after I found out that she was that much younger.
We had sex in his home twice.
I didn't see his wife at the house, but there was a-a situation, um, between me, him and the younger woman where he did tell me that his wife was upstairs when we were in the-- I call it the Colorado Room, the one with all the wood, where the infamous sex tape was filmed-- that room, when we were down there, one time, he did tell me that she was upstairs.
PRODUCER: The girls that were seeing the other side of him, did you notice them? Do you know how-- Were they young at that time? No.
He never brought any of them around me.
He was never abusive to anybody in front of me.
He was never a person that, you know, like, "Hey, do y'all hear that in the room next door? Is that fighting or something?" I mean, we have to be realistic about the story line, too.
Seeing some (bleep) like that, you-- we really are not gonna be together, because you're showing me up front who your monster is, so I think that he strategically did what he did with me.
He kept it away from me for a reason.
It's like sometimes I often wish I would have just known up front; I really do.
I wish that I would have been able to see the fullness of the monster I was dealing with because it probably would have saved me years and years of pain.
It would have saved me years of abuse.
It would have saved me years of being alienated from my family if I just would have known up front what the hell I'm dealing with.
LISA: When we first started having sex, Rob was behind the camera, and he pretty much would talk us through the motions.
He would never ask me if, um, it was okay to be filmed, but he never hid the camera or anything like that.
He would just pull-pull out his tripod and his camera.
And he had the whole thing, the lighting.
He'd set it up and he-he liked to-to have control of the situation because he would tell you what to do anyways when you were having sex.
When he would put the camera up, he'd just say, "Make sure you're sitting properly for the camera, you know, for whatever angle.
" And when he'd be done filming, he'd just put it in his bag.
It was 2000, around the same time when I did the "I Wish" video with him.
I was in the studio, I was in the room, and he left the bag in the room with me.
And I just happened to open the bag up, and I started popping the tapes in to see what was on them.
It was just a whole bunch of different tapes with him having sex with different young girls, I guess, and women.
But I came across the one with me, him and the 14-year-old.
I watched it and, as I fast-forwarded some, I'd see other scenes with just him and her, without me.
Her face, her chest, it's just, wherever it was going, he just was-- as if she was a toilet, he was just peeing.
You know, just letting it go wherever.
I thought it was gross and-and weird and, uh, belittling.
In regards to the tapes, Robert taping himself, he's always did that.
Robert recorded everything.
I mean, R.
Kelly tapes his sexual encounters.
And he watched his own movies.
Abusers often want trophies from their criminal acts, so people will take things and be able to place memories and place maybe even sexual feelings on trophies that they've taken.
And it's power play.
You get to actively replay the act.
And when that's not enough, then you make another tape.
LISA: When I saw it, you know, it upset me, and I didn't want him to have possession of the tape anymore, 'cause I was on it, and I took it and kept it on me, and when I got a chance to go back to my hotel room, I left it at my hotel room, and he never noticed it was gone.
I actually didn't hold onto the tape that long at all because I was afraid that he'd find out that I had it.
I had befriended a few of his other artists, and I actually asked one of them if they could hold the tape for me.
I remember the first time we were in Detroit and he came to me and he told me about the videotapes.
He'd say, uh, "Man, you got to help me, man.
"We got to pray, man, 'cause these videos, man, I can't stop taping myself, man, and" and so we prayed.
I was privy, and shown, um, videos while I was still employed and, you know, around, yes.
Um, I never saw the-the bag's videos, because I think I would've been like, "Man, what the hell are you doing?" You know? "What-what are you doing?" But yes, I-I did see several, several videos.
DEMETRIUS: You know, I didn't know what was ahead, with those tapes, but Robert did.
And he used to come to me and he used to talk to me about that.
He'd say, "Man, this is gonna get me in trouble, man.
"I can't seem to stop.
This is gonna destroy me.
" My name is Abdon Pallasch.
I was the legal affairs reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times.
Our rock critic, Jim DeRogatis, got a fax laying out that there was a relationship going on with R.
Kelly and an underage girl.
Jim's the one who really heard about the dynamic that was going on in which people in R.
Kelly's own circle were saying that there was an issue there where he was just hanging out with young girls.
And Jim had gotten word that some of these young women had actually filed suit against him.
You know, he approached me as the legal affairs reporter, you know, "Can we check this out?" And, you know, I went and started pulling lawsuits and, sure enough, there were some.
And they generally settled out of court.
But the allegations were pretty explosive.
We started uncovering a series of lawsuits that had been filed and settlements that had been reached with-with young women that claim that-that they had sex with R.
Kelly when they were underage.
Our first story ran December 21, 2000.
And it said that R.
Kelly had been sued by all these girls.
The suits, all added together, seemed to show a pattern of behavior of him going after very young girls for sexual relationships.
Immediately after our story ran, -we started getting calls.
-(phone ringing) Other girls who said this has happened to them, from girls who said it happened to their friends.
And we-we did follow-up interviews with as many of them as we could.
A lot of them were very reluctant and shy.
And a lot of times, they wouldn't want to have their names used or even have their full stories appear.
These confidential settlements, you know, if the girls go public, they-they lose the settlement.
You have to pay it back.
So there's a limit to how much more we're gonna get from-from people that had already been involved in-in those sort of suits.
LEMIEUX: These are five, six-figure settlements.
And so, there we see the beginning of an ecosystem, right? Like, there's a-- there's a system of protecting R.
Kelly from accountability.
They said they were minors.
-Mm-hmm.
-You settled out of court.
-Yeah.
-In this country, many people will assume that means you were guilty.
Why'd you settle? I really can't go into detail about that particular thing, because, when I filed the lawsuit, um, of course, I signed, uh, a piece of paper saying I couldn't discuss -those particular people in the situation.
-So there's a confidentiality -agreement after the fact.
-Exactly.
Exactly.
TARANA BURKE: The idea that R.
Kelly was using nondisclosure agreements to keep these young girls and their families quiet, that means that he is cognizant of the kind of things that he's doing and he's trying to protect himself on the front end.
And I think that this is the thing that makes him, to me, more the-- more of a predator.
LEMIEUX: You can get people to sign NDAs.
We can make people go away with a check.
We don't have to do this in court, in front of the cameras and in front of, you know, the paparazzi and the tabloids.
We can make these things go away.
His camp was very unhappy and pushed back hard and said it was all false.
But they couldn't point to any part of the story that was actually false, 'cause it was all taken from court documents.
LISA: At this point, there were tapes floating around.
I-I didn't want a sex tape of me floating around the Internet or on TV or anything, so the only thing I could think of doing at that point would be to, um, to see if Rob could figure out a way to get the tape back.
I actually ended up contacting Rob and told him that I had took the tape.
He flew me back up to Chicago.
I told him that they probably wouldn't just give it back to me, that they probably need something, or whatever, to get it back.
And so he arranged for them to be paid to get him back his tape.
He had them take lie detector tests, well, one of the guys, and me, and, uh, I passed, and the guy did not because he was lying, he said that he didn't make any copies, and he actually did.
So, um, he ended up giving, you know, like, a little payment for that copy and then he said, "When you bring the rest back, you'll get, you know, the rest of the money.
" Rob said $250,000 was what it was gonna be.
He actually gave the money to his accountant.
You know, he ended up getting the tape, uh, for Rob on the last, uh, visit that I went up there.
I just didn't know that there was a point in time where where they were talking where they were talking about killing me.
So we started doing the stories, and we'd heard that there was videotapes out there of R.
Kelly with the underage girls, and we'd let it be known that we'd be happy to, you know, get those tapes, if they could assist in our reporting.
One day, an anonymous video was-was dropped off in Jim's mailbox.
So this appeared to be R.
Kelly engaging in sex with an underage girl.
Tongues are really wagging, ears are really burning, because they're like, "Did you hear about this sex tape?" So that means everything else that we've been hearing, we knew it was true.
That set everything off.
MITCHELL: The newsroom was in an uproar.
The editors had to make a decision whether or not this was so important that we could sit and view a tape and to basically pursue a story that literally was based in pornography, child pornography.
So it was very easy to look at that videotape and believe that that was R.
Kelly on the tape and that the girl was underage.
She looked like a child.
I got to tell you, as a mother and as a grandmother and as a black woman, I was sickened by what I saw.
It contained very graphic, um hardcore porn.
If I could just be blunt.
Various sexual acts, including urination, oral sex, everything that you can name.
PALLASCH: There'd just be denial after denial from people in the community that knew R.
Kelly.
They'd just say, "Oh, it's all wrong, it's all wrong.
These are people out to get R.
Kelly.
" But, you know, you can't be dissuaded, you can't be, uh, intimidated out of these things.
We didn't let up our reporting at all.
We were made aware that there was a 14-year-old girl.
His bass player's daughter that he was, uh, having an-an, a sexual relationship with at that time we were doing the stories.
SPARKLE: Chicago Sun-Times contacted me and wanted me to come down to their offices to view tapes that possibly had, um, girls on it that I may have known.
On the tape, my niece has the same hairstyle she had when she turned 14.
That was her, for sure.
And that was him, definitely.
My name is Raven, and I was friends with the girl in the tape since 1997, junior high on.
We bonded over basketball.
She and I were the, you know, star basketball players of our junior high team.
We spent a lot of time together, both on and off the court.
Her personality was vibrant.
Always happy, always having a great time, the life of the party.
Just a really fun, wonderful person to be around.
JACQUES CONWAY: Oak Park is a small town, so you get to know people quite well.
As a coach, I saw her play from junior high up until she got on my team as a sophomore in high school.
Her parents were very responsible, like any family in Oak Park River Forest.
You know, two parents who worked, sent their kid to the same school they went to.
Very supportive of their kids' activities by attending those events.
GENGLER: R.
Kelly would come to some basketball games.
I would see him in the stands.
It almost seemed like a doting father when R.
Kelly would see her.
CONWAY: It was just strange for me, to see a-a grown man hanging out at a high school with high school girls.
SPARKLE: Like, you hear things, but to see it visually, and for her to be so young it (bleep) me up.
It really did-- like, it's over with, but it still haunts me.
You know? And I hate this (bleep), that it happened.
It shouldn't have happened.
I should have never introduced her to him.
I should have never introduced my family to him.
Like, how dare you.
How dare you.
SPARKLE: How dare you.
(sniffles) What the (bleep)? "What are you doing, Robert?" Like, I never thought he would do this (bleep) to my family.
I don't know how the Sun-Times got the tape.
Who dropped it off, who sent it, who threw it-- I-I have no idea.
There was a money transaction from Robert to my niece in the beginning of this videotape.
After the money transaction, then there was a transaction (laughs softly) if you understand what I'm saying.
A sexual transaction.
And I didn't need to see any more, 'cause I knew it was her.
PALLASCH: We were able to confirm it was indeed her at a time when she was 14.
R.
Kelly and an underage girl having sex.
Here, we have evidence of a felony.
Now, you don't want to become an arm of the prosecution.
Journalists are supposed to be separate and apart from that.
But if you find a body in the lobby of the Sun-Times, you call the police.
And we ultimately did.
Here was a child who was being used by a grown man for sexual gratification, and obviously, no one cared.
People knew what was going on at his, uh, residence.
They probably saw this girl in and out, but proving that was a different thing.
It was obvious she was young.
It was on tape.
Everybody saw it.
It shows you how rich and powerful men can get away with a lot of things.
But it also shows the power imbalance between the abuser and the victim, as well.
Ever since this-this tape thing, this rumor has come out, you know, there's been a whole lot of people, you know, uh, it's been a R.
Kelly Day, man.
It's been people trying to, you know, say this or say that, coming out of the woodwork for me, you know, just trying to get paid.
I'm not a monster that people, that people are saying I am, and, uh, if people out there have a tape of me, and they're saying it's with me and a young girl, a minor, then they're sadly mistaken or they're lying.
(film projector clicking) JOVANTE: In his mind, I think he believes some of his own sick lies.
In his mind, he didn't do it.
He has no level of personal accountability as it relates to his poor behavior.
His attempt to say it wasn't him is ridiculous.
At one point, he's having sex with this woman, and somebody is yelling from another room, you know, "R.
Kells, pick up the phone.
It's phone for you" and, like, yelling his name.
PALLASCH: Eventually, bootleg copies of the tape start showing up around the country.
People are watching it in clubs.
MITCHELL: This tape was duplicated and was for sale all over the South Side.
So you could drive up to a, one of these, uh, outdoor flea markets and get a tape of R.
Kelly-- allegedly R.
Kelly-- having sex with an underage girl.
This is before the whole advent of-of sex tapes, and I think the tape came on VHS.
As a matter of fact, it was a VHS tape.
That tape was rushed to me from Chicago.
I'm looking at this tape, I'm like, "Oh" Robert has a problem.
A lot of people saw that pee tape.
It was circulating in the streets, it was, like, a bootleg that went around.
I don't remember what I was thinking at that time, but I'm like, "How did he get away with this?" BURKE: When I think about this grown man urinating in the mouth of a child, and how degrading that is, when I first heard it, it just really concretized for me that this person is a monster.
The tape is incredibly graphic.
That makes it almost impossible-- or should have made it impossible-- for people to pretend that they did not know that this person had a thing for little girls.
It's strange.
You have R.
Kelly performing at the opening ceremonies of the Olympics at the same time that there was this sex tape.
So for R.
Kelly to be there, just speaks to how huge he was.
ANN POWERS: The story of sexual predation as an inconvenience in popular music is so old.
It's been going on for decades, centuries.
Nobody wants to give up the music they love and nobody wants to think badly of the artists they love.
And I think that happened with R.
Kelly.
SPARKLE: I was pissed.
I'm like, "Who would do this?" Not only was I pissed at Robert for filming this (bleep), I was pissed at the person who put this out, because I'm like, "Look, this is a little girl on this tape.
" "Why would y'all do that?" CONWAY: I was made aware by, uh, some students that there was a, a, uh, tape, a sex tape.
One of my basketball players with R.
Kelly.
Uh, and they were selling it on the West Side of Chicago.
My specialty was sex crimes against minors for the Oak Park Police Department, so I went to the West Side, got a copy of this tape.
And I actually saw it at the police station.
It was just very disheartening, it was very sad.
This was the first victim that I personally knew.
And so, it was very heart-- uh, heartfelt to-to experience this, to see it, and felt that something had to be done about it.
Watching the tape and just thinking about, you know, if that were me or if that were my daughter, it just, obviously, tears me apart.
I wouldn't want that to happen to any young lady who's still young, still figuring out life, just looking up to this person who's supposed to be somebody that you trust and that trust, obviously, being taken complete advantage of.
PRODUCER: When you found out about that tape, can you tell me how you found out about it? (quietly): It don't even matter.
It doesn't matter how I found out about that tape.
What matters is that it existed.
It doesn't matter.
Who cares? Should've never happened.
I love that baby.
Like she was mine.
That was my baby.
And for him to do that to her Man LISA: It was 2000.
I had just turned 20 years old.
I ended up, um, missing my period and I told Rob that I thought that I was pregnant.
And he asked me to, um, did I take a pregnancy test? I told him I did, and, um, after that, he asked me to get another test and then to take that one in front of him.
And I did that, and it came up positive.
And, um, he asked me what did I want to do, and I told him, "To get an abortion.
" He contacted his assistant and a week later, we went to Planned Parenthood and I had my abortion.
It kind of was, like, the only option to me because, um, I didn't really want to have a kid by him.
I was concerned with if it would be a girl, what I would have to deal with, so I knew she would get older at some point.
There were, there were things that I just had to think about in my mind, you know, "Okay, he did this "with someone else's, um, child, I mean, what would keep him from doing that to mine?" PRODUCER: What was he like as a father? Was he loving with your children? I think Robert loved our children the best way he knew how.
He didn't have a father figure in his life, so he really didn't know how to be a father.
He just knew how to provide.
MITCHELL: The thing about Andrea Kelly and him marrying her is that nobody saw her after that.
It was like she was locked up, uh, o-on their estate, and she wasn't allowed out.
There were stories about-- that even if they, she wanted to get her hair done, or get her makeup done, the people had to come to her, that she was not allowed to come out.
And so it was a real odd, strange situation.
People were wondering, especially journalists, why in the midst of all these allegations of him having sex with underage girls, number one, why would she marry him? And number two, was she really free to ever leave home? Was she a prisoner in her own home? Just, what that relationship was all about.
There was a lot of speculation about what was going on in the Kelly household.
ANDREA: I would always hear rumors about, "Oh, he's being sued by this person, and sued by that person" And it almost seemed like every other week, he was in the tabloids for something.
Another person's coming forward, and I'm thinking to myself, like, "When did you have time? Are there more--" like, "Do you have a doppelganger around here that I don't know about?" Like, "When do you have time "to go to the studio, play basketball, come abuse me, "be a dad-- when you wanted to-- "and then go destroy other people's lives, and still be on the road and shoot videos?" Like, it was just, my mind couldn't fathom, like, "How are you doing all this?" And why didn't I know anything about it? And I think the frustration set in because it then became very real to me: "Drea, the reason why you don't know and he's able to do it, because he has people helping him.
" BURKE: He had to have backup in order to continue this level of behavior that he had.
His predatory behavior was supported by the people around him, in his camp.
And also, it points, to me, to the person who understands that they're doing something wrong.
Right? That you know that you're doing something wrong if you have to create systems to protect yourself from being exposed.
PRODUCER: Did you ever meet his wife? Um, there were times where she'd be checking in to the same hotel as me at the same time.
She might be with his publicist, and I'd be with his assistant.
He kept us apart.
You have your team, you have your cover-up people.
You have lawyers settling claims out of court.
Not trying to be funny: you don't read and write well, so you're not booking flights.
Who's booking these flights? Who's-who's telling the driver to go pick people up? Who's getting these hotel rooms? He's not doing it on his own.
CRAIG: I tell you, I don't know if the music industry in all knew about what was going on with Rob, but I do know that around Rob's camp, everyone knew, and nothing was done.
And when you have those type of people who are your yes-men around you, uh, it will continue to happen.
And if it wasn't right, it was obviously buried so that the rest of the world didn't know about it.
DEMETRIUS: That's the way it was.
It was every day, you know? It's the same routine, because he can have his way.
We work for him, and this is what he wanted and so this is what we were supposed to get him.
If you're an adult who's around him and you're aware and you're not saying anything, you're just as sick as he is.
Please understand that.
It doesn't make you any better because you're not doing it.
If you're aware and you're not saying anything, you're just as sick.
LEMIEUX: You've had these relations with young girls.
There's a video.
We're not talking about rumors at this point, we're talking about something that we can watch, to this day.
So it feels like they're taking a stand against black girls.
It feels like they're taking a stance to say, "Protecting Robert Kelly and his ability to make music "and entertain fans means more than what he did in his private life with these little girls.
" (cheering) R.
Kelly has done a really good job at sort of spreading himself around musically.
So he's got these hypersexual songs like "Bump n' Grind," and then he's got the inspirational songs like "I Believe I Can Fly.
" And (scoffs) I mean, you know, how can the guy who made "I Believe I Can Fly," which is played on Sunday mornings in church, in many black churches, how can that guy be wrong? One young exec stated, "I don't care if that is him on that tape, because we can't afford to lose him.
" I was like, "Wow.
That's some serious (bleep).
" Can't afford to lose him, and you don't care if it is him on this tape, with a young girl.
I was like, "That shows what type of (scoffs) person you are.
" When someone like R.
Kelly gets in trouble, there-there's this knee-jerk instinct to protect him from "the system.
" From the hand of the law, from all these forces that are at play to make sure that black people-- black men in particular-- don't succeed.
We have to stand by him.
We have to take care of him.
But his crimes were against black women and girls.
And that was devastating for me, because at this point, we already knew, but now we know some more.
You know, that this Aaliyah thing was not a moment.
This wasn't, "Oh, my God, she was just so mature, she was just, I was just spellbound, there was just something about her.
" It wasn't just those rumors about Kenwood.
It's on tape, and it's disgusting.
And the tape is being distributed in-in barbershops and on porn sites and it's everywhere.
And people are still not willing to say "I can't do this with you anymore.
" I called my oldest brother and I told him that I just had seen a tape, and it showed our niece on it.
You know, I didn't want to bring it to my sister because I don't know how to bring this to her.
I couldn't really keep my head in the game at this point.
What mattered was me protecting my family or-or me protecting my niece.
You know what I mean? That's all that mattered to me.
And I was estranged from the family.
They felt like I was tarnishing the family's name.
Tarnishing the family name? No.
Robert tarnished the family's name by putting our niece, your daughter, out there like that.
He set out to destroy that family.
That's what I believe, in my heart.
I believe he tried to divide that family with his poor behavior.
Sparkle is my friend, she is my son's godmother.
She has been and is like a mother to me.
I have always been her little girl, and I will always be her little girl.
And I watched my friend give up her career to save her family.
Robert knows what he did.
He's not confused about what he did.
Once I came out publicly, yeah, there was a lot of blowback.
People were unbelieving, people thought I was hating.
People thought I was jealous.
People were still able to dismiss Sparkle because they felt like she's just trying to get money.
What happened to Sparkle is like, "You are messing with the money, "you are in violation, you are talking out of turn, and now we're gonna shut you down.
" It run the gamut of loaded and unloaded (bleep) that people were saying about me, to me, to-- about my family, you know, about my niece.
Her being a little fast girl, like, come on.
She's 14 years old.
The adult is supposed to know not to touch that.
GENGLER: I just remember being completely blown away, and for this to be happening not only with a high-profile person that you look up to and admire, but also somebody that you were very close with, and at the time, thought everything was fine.
I felt really upset because at the same time, I'm like, "Well, why wasn't I there for her? How did I not know? How could I have been there for her?" Thinking all these things that I could've done.
(film projector clicking) JOVANTE: He has no moral clock.
And I can only imagine what his wife and his children have endured and did endure.
I can only imagine.
I know what I've seen.
I can only imagine.
I can only imagine.
-ED GORDON: You also have a family.
-Yeah.
How are they dealing with this? You have two children.
Well, my wife is totally behind me, because she knows the truth, and-and she's in my corner.
ANDREA: He put me on the bus in the middle of the night, did not tell me why we're going, what we're going for.
He shipped me off to Florida, and I'm just staying in this house.
I don't know what's going on, I got security at the door, nobody's telling me anything, like, "Why are we here, why did we leave Illinois?" I'm pregnant, I'm supposed to be going to the doctor, at least once a week at this point.
I should not be traveling.
"What is going on?" No one would tell me anything.
I was just broken.
CRAIG: Behind the scenes, the allegations had come.
It was known this tape was there, prior.
It was obviously buried so that the rest of the world didn't know about it, until this tape and those allegations popped up.
He put me on the bus in the middle of the night, did not tell me why we're going, what we're going for.
He shipped me off to Florida, and I'm just staying in this house.
I don't know what's going on, I got security at the door, nobody's telling me anything, like, "Why are we here, why did we leave Illinois?" I'm pregnant.
I'm supposed to be going to the doctor, at least once a week at this point.
I should not be traveling.
"What is going on?" No one would tell me anything.
I was under so much stress that when I went to the ob-gyn, they couldn't find his heartbeat.
And I remember getting to the emergency room and my best friend Angie was with me and I just remember coming through the door and they had papers and signing and people were grabbing me and putting stuff in my arm and I'm like, "Wait, wait, wait, wait," like, "what are you guys doing?" And they're like, "We have to induce your labor right away, because we don't know if the baby's gonna make it.
" I just remember them laying me on the bed, and they were like, "We're gonna give you Pitocin, we're gonna get this going.
Come on, Mom.
" And I went through the labor, and I just remember falling so in love with Little Rob because he came here so strong, but I was in that much stress that it put my unborn child's life in jeopardy.
'Cause here I am, by myself in Florida.
I don't know anybody, I just have my best friend.
And they eventually, again, had to go through ten people to get him on the phone.
(sniffles) "Mr.
Kelly, do you know that they induced your wife's labor? Like, she just had Little Rob.
" (sniffles) He said he was coming back.
But again, I don't know where he is.
And I remember after having him, that's when that day happened.
MAN: Mr.
Kelly has been indicted.
There's been a warrant issued for his arrest, and the Chicago Police Department is currently seeking to arrest Mr.
Kelly.
RICHARD DEVINE: We charge that the acts took place in Kelly's home in Chicago.
These indictments, hopefully, will send a message to sexual predators that taking advantage of minors will not be tolerated and that there are severe penalties.
I'm sitting here with the baby, and then it comes across the screen, they're like, "R&B singer R.
Kelly has been arrested on child pornography," and I just remember my best friend was with me and she said she don't know what happened, but my body went limp, and she said she caught Little Rob before he hit the floor.
And I remember, like, a buzzing sound.
It almost felt like I couldn't hear.
And I saw the screen, and they showed his name and the police, and I just, I don't even remember a lot after that.
REPORTER: What about the child porn charges? (women shouting) CHANEY: The police found media of R.
Kelly with plenty of other young girls that appeared to be underage.
NEWSWOMAN: Kelly is accused of videotaping himself having sex with an underage girl.
Y'all need to leave him alone.
That's not R.
Kelly.
Women lined up to show support for R.
Kelly.
I love me some R.
Kelly.
JERHONDA: I went to his trial because I was a superfan at the time.
NORCOTT: At the courthouse, his eyes were always fixated on the young girls.
Do you like teenage girls? He invited me back to his mansion in Olympia Fields.
You know what you did.
And he told me to bring a bathing suit.
You know the turmoil you brought into my kids' life I was 14 years old.
and for that, you can go to hell.