Going to NYPD
R. Kelly accuser is defying his ‘threats’
One of R. Kelly’s chief accusers was set to meet with NYPD officials in New York on Monday, lawyer Gloria Allred said at a news conference.
Faith Rodgers, 21, agreed to the meeting as part of the NYPD’s “investigation into potential victims” of the Grammy-winning R&B artist, the civil rights lawyer said.
“Faith is just there to provide information, and then it will be up to the prosecutor’s office to decide if any criminal case should be filed,” Allred said, appearing with Rodgers at the Lotte New York Palace hotel in Manhattan.
“She is doing her duty to provide information that is requested by them. And that had to be done in person, and that is why she’s in New York.”
Rodgers sued Kelly in Manhattan in May, claiming he forced her to have “nonpermissive, painful and abusive sex” in a New York hotel in 2017 and knowingly infected her with herpes.
She claims Kelly manipulated her into a yearlong relationship during which he routinely locked her up in rooms and vehicles as “punishment” for “failing to please” him.
“I trusted him and he betrayed my trust,” Rodgers told reporters Monday. “Once I recognized my worth, I knew I had to walk away.”
The young woman appeared with her mother by her side as Allred said Kelly tried to intimidate Rodgers into silence by sending a threatening letter to Rodgers’ New Yorkbased lawyer Lydia Agu in October. “Please advise Ms. Rodgers, your client, to abandon this heartless effort to try to destroy my musical legacy for selfish, personal enrichment,” Kelly wrote in the letter released Monday. “If she persists in (the) court action she will be subjected to public opinion during the discovery process.”
Kelly threatened to demand “the medical test results proving the origin of her STD claim” and have “10 personal male witnesses testifying under oath about her sex life” if she didn’t back down, according to the letter.
Rodgers was not swayed, she said Monday. “No woman should be victim-shamed, harassed or retaliated against because she asserted her rights and spoke her truth,” she said.
In her suit, Rodgers says she met Kelly in March 2017 after one of his shows in Texas, were she lives. She was 19 and claims Kelly plied her with alcohol, asked for her number and vowed to help her “develop a career in entertainment,” according to the complaint.
“Robert Kelly, the Faith Rodgers you met when she was 19 years old was vulnerable and impressionable,” Rodgers said Monday, referring to Kelly by his full name. “The 21-year-old Faith Rodgers you are seeing now is stronger and wiser. I have learned not to ignore the signs of abuse, manipulation and intimidation.”
Monday’s news conference came a week after Lifetime aired its six-part documentary, “Surviving R. Kelly,” which featured highly damaging interviews with accusers.
The docuseries detailed the long history of allegations against Kelly, including claims he preyed on underage girls for decades and brainwashed victims into joining a sex cult.
Kelly, 52, has repeatedly denied the allegations, and his lawyer reportedly threatened legal action against Lifetime before the docuseries aired.
Best known for a series of hit singles, including “I Believe I Can Fly” and “Ignition (Remix),” Kelly married singer Aaliyah in 1994 when she was 15 and he was 27, according to a wedding certificate obtained by Vibe magazine.
In 2002, a video was sent to Chicago Sun-Times reporter Jim DeRogatis that appeared to show Kelly having sex with a teen girl and urinating in her mouth. Kelly was indicted on 21 counts of child porn related to the recording but was acquitted when jurors decided they couldn’t identify the girl, who didn’t testify, with any certainty. In 2017, DeRogatis wrote a BuzzFeed exposé depicting Kelly as the “pied piper” of a sex cult that controlled victims by taking away their cell phones, imposing strict rules and limiting contact with family members.