The first part of a new interview with R. Kelly—his first since being charged with 10 counts of aggravated sexual abuse in Cook County, Illinois—aired Wednesday, March 6 on “CBS This Morning.” The second part airs Thursday, March 7. In the interview with Gayle King, Kelly angrily denies the accusations of being involved with underage girls. “Whether they’re old rumors, new rumors, future rumors—not true.” In another section of the interview, Kelly’s responses become more emotional and confrontational. Watch it below.
In the first part of the interview, King asks Kelly about his relationship with Joycelyn Savage (age 21) and Azriel Clary (23), two women who live with R. Kelly and have supported him publicly. He responds, “I love ’em and it’s almost—it’s like they’re my girlfriends. It’s like, you know, we have a relationship. It’s real. And I know guys—like, I’ve known guys all my life that have five or six women, okay? So don’t go there on me, okay? ’Cause that’s the truth.”
Asked about the severe age gap between himself and the women, he says, “I don’t look at much younger than me. I just look at legal. I just look at you’re you, I’m me. Now, I don’t know if you're married. I don’t know. I don’t know if you have a relationship. I don’t know what you – you know, I don’t know. But one might be older than the other. One might be younger than the other, okay? So I just look at legal, okay? People. There are older men that like younger women … there are younger women that like older men.”
Kelly goes on to claim that Savage’s father brought her to one of his shows when she was 19. Clary’s parents say they took their daughter to an R. Kelly concert when she was 17, hoping he would make her his protégé, according to CBS. Kelly denied they had sex when Clary was 17: “Absolutely not. Although, her parents wanted me to,” he claims. The parents claim they have text messages proving Kelly had sex with her when she was 17. Kelly responded, “Claim, claim.”
He goes on to claim that Savage and Clary “handed” their daughters to him, saying, “What kind of father, what kind of mother, will sell their daughter to a man? How come it was okay for me to see them until they wasn't getting no money from me?” Lawyer Michael Avenatti, who says he is representing Alice and Angelo Clary, issued a statement denying the claim:
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During a press conference held on March 6, Joycelyn Savage’s parents denied Kelly’s claims that they had ever accepted money from him. “I can state here, unequivocally, that at no point have the Savages requested money from Mr. Robert Sylvester Kelly, they have never received any money from Robert Sylvester Kelly, they don’t want any money from Robert Sylvester Kelly.”
In a segment airing Thursday, Joycelyn Savage and Azriel Clary defend Kelly. “You guys believe in some facade that our parents are saying,” Clary says. “This is all lies for money.”
In a different clip, King brings up Lady Gaga’s apology for working with Kelly. “The interesting thing about this is the fact, working with Lady Gaga, she’s a very great talent and all,” Kelly said. “It’s unfortunate that her intelligence go to such a short level when it comes to that.”
On Friday, February 22, Kelly turned himself in to authorities and pled not guilty to the aggravated criminal sexual abuse charges. He was released from jail on bond on February 25. The charges, which stem from incidents that allegedly happened from 1998 to 2010, involve three underage girls and one 24-year-old woman.
In a separate case, R. Kelly was recently sued by a woman named Heather Williams, who claims Kelly sexually abused her in 1998 when she was 16 years old. Lisa VanAllen, a woman who testified against Kelly in his 2008 child pornography case, wrote a New York Times op-ed.
Read “The Struggle to Silence R. Kelly” on the Pitch.
This article was originally published on Tuesday, March 5 at 7:41 p.m. Eastern. It was last updated on Wednesday, March 6 at 10:34 a.m. Eastern.
