R. Kelly ‘cult’ claims and past controversies
Singer R. Kelly is accused of holding women in a “cult.” Here’s a look back at the Grammy-winner's past controversies
R. Kelly swears he "didn't do this stuff" and he's "fighting for his life" in his first interview since "Surviving R. Kelly" dropped and new allegations of sex abuse surfaced.
"I'm very tired of all of the um, lies, I've been hearing things and seeing things on the blogs, and I'm just tired," he told Gayle King on "CBS This Morning" on Wednesday.
The lies that bothered Kelly most, he said, included "that little girls trapped in a basement, helicopters over my house, trying to rescue someone who doesn't need to be rescued because they're not in my house."
Gayle King and R. Kelly on "CBS This Morning" (CBS)
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"[I did] lots of things wrong when it comes to women but I apologized in those relationships," he said. He adamantly denied breaking any laws when it comes to women.
"Everybody says something bad about me. Nobody said something good. They was describing Lucifer. I'm not Lucifer. I'm a man. I made mistakes, but I'm not a devil."
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Kelly blamed "the power of social media" for spreading rumors about his alleged abuse and giving them traction.
"No. No. No," he said when asked if he'd ever had sex with any minors, adding that his accusers were "absolutely" lying. "I have been assassinated. I have been buried alive from these lies."
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"I don't need to. Why would I? How stupid would it be for R. Kelly, with all that I've been through in my way, way, past to hold somebody — that's stupid," he shouted.
He fumed, "That's stupid! Use your common sense. Forget the blogs, forget how you feel about me. Hate me if you want to, love me if you want. But just use your common sense. How stupid would it be for me, with my crazy past and what I've been through — 'Oh, right now I just think I need to be a monster and hold girls against their will, chain them up in my basement, and don't let them eat, don't let them out, unless they need some shoes down the street from their uncle!'"
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Kelly then got up and shrieked, sobbing, "Stop it. You don't quit playing. Quit playing. I didn't do this stuff! This is not me! I'm fighting for my f—king life!"
He cried, "It's not about music, it's about having a relationship with my kids."
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"I need help. This is the kind of help I need. I need somebody to help me not have a big heart. My heart is so big. People betray me and I keep on giving to them."
Kelly was acquitted of child pornography charges in 2008 that centered on a graphic video that prosecutors said showed him having sex with a girl as young as 13.
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"For one, I beat my case. When you beat something you beat it. You can't double jeopardy me like that. It's not fair," he said.
Michael Avenatti, a lawyer for two Kelly accusers, responded to Kelly's "double jeopardy" comment Tuesday on Twitter.
"He fails to understand that it doesn't matter 'how long ago' it happened. And he also has no clue as to how 'double jeopardy' works," the attorney tweeted.
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In a follow-up tweet, Avenatti addressed the emotion that Kelly shows in the interview: "R. Kelly's tears are out of fear and despair. Because he knows that after over two decades of sexually abusing underage girls, we blew this wide open and have him and his enablers dead to rights."
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King's colleagues asked her if she felt unsafe during the interview, which she denied.
"I never felt that," she said, adding that she didn't think he'd hit her deliberately but that she said she may have been "accidentally clobbered ... I never felt in danger talking to him."
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In a second segment, King asked Kelly about his relationship with the two young women currently living in his home, Joycelyn Savage and Azriel Clary, both 21.
"I love 'em and it's almost like, they're my girlfriends," he said. "We have a relationship. It's real. I've known guys all my life who've had five or six women."
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When asked if he was attracted to young women and girls, Kelly responded, "I don't look at much younger than me. I look at legal," adding of relationships in general, "One might be older than the other, one might be younger than the other. I just look at legal. There are older men that like younger women, there are younger women that like older men ... I'm a man who likes all women."
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When asked about Clary, he said, "I'm seeing her." He denied "seeing her" or having a sexual relationship with her when she was 17, though he alleges her parents encouraged him to date her at the time.
"What kind of father, what kind of mother will sell their daughter to a man? How come it was OK for me to see them until they weren't getting no money from me?" He agreed with King's assertion that the girls' parents "handed them over."
"I think they should [buy my music], a lot of them may not. I'm really not fighting for my career here. I'm fighting for my rights and I'm fighting for my relationship with my kids."
He said of his children, "They're pressured [not to have a relationship with me]. They're pressured, and I get it."
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When King asked Kelly how he'd react if his daughter told him someone did to her what he's been accused of, he replied, "I'd be up in that motherf—ker's face f—king everything up ... I would have to arrest myself after I did what I had to do."
He said the sexual abuse he suffered as a child didn't affect his behavior as an adult, but has affected his music.
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He's said he was considering getting help but maintains his innocence despite public opinion being plagued against him.
"People have perception," he said. "I have truth."
In a preview for King's interview with Savage and Clary, the girls denied being brainwashed, abused or held against their will.
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"I'm crying because you don't know the truth," Clary sobbed, adding that her parents were lying to extort money from the singer.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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