R. Kelly’s daughter accuses singer of childhood abuse

Buku Abi, the daughter of jailed singer R. Kelly, has come forward with allegations that she was sexually abused by her father during her childhood.

Abi, now 26, shared her traumatic experience in a documentary aired on the TVEI Streaming Network, revealing that fear prevented her from speaking about the abuse to her mother at the time.

R. Kelly, who has been imprisoned since 2021, is serving multiple lengthy sentences for various sexual crimes.

These new allegations by his daughter add another disturbing layer to the accusations surrounding the disgraced singer.

“He was my everything. For a long time, I didn’t even want to believe that it happened. I didn’t know that even if he was a bad person that he would do something to me,” she said, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Abi’s mother, Drea Kelly, corroborated her daughters claims saying the singer shouldn’t have abused their child. “What he did to me, he did to me. But you didn’t have to do it to my damn kids,” she said.

Abi said she now struggles with her childhood trauma.

“I really feel like that one millisecond completely just changed my whole life and changed who I was as a person and changed the sparkle I had and the light I used to carry. After I told my mom, I didn’t go over there any more.

“My brother [Robert] and sister [Jaah], we didn’t go over there any more. And even up until now, I struggle with it a lot,” she said.

Jennifer Bonjean, who is R Kelly’s lawyer, accused the ex-wife of having made the same allegation several years ago but were found to be untrue.

Bonjean claimed the allegations were investigated by the Illinois Department of Children & Family Services and were declared “unfounded”.

She said the documentary makers didn’t give the singer a chance to deny what he called “hurtful claims”.