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New abuse allegations against R Kelly as DJ describes two-year ordeal

Singer R Kelly faces new allegations of abuse
R Kelly faces new allegations of abuse. Photograph: Scott Gries/Getty Images

A former radio host has alleged that R Kelly physically and mentally abused her, while controlling all elements of her life, from her clothing to when she was allowed to use the toilet.

In an extensive interview in Rolling Stone, Kitti Jones alleges that for a two-year period after the pair met at a concert in her hometown of Dallas, Kelly conducted an abusive and controlling relationship with the DJ. Kelly – born Robert Kelly – categorically denies all the allegations.

After meeting Kelly at the concert in 2011, Jones agreed to meet him again at the next leg of his tour. When they met in a hotel room, Jones says Kelly exposed himself and – without acknowledging her presence – began masturbating in front of her.

“I’m thinking we’re going to hug or peck each other. But he plopped down on the couch and pulled out his penis and started pleasuring himself,” she told the magazine.

Jones put the incident down to Kelly having “weird ways of getting off” and continued the relationship, eventually relocating to Chicago and moving in to the singer’s apartment.

Before the move, Kelly cautioned her about his relationships with other women and described them as people he had “raised”. “He said, ‘I have friends and I have girls I’ve raised,’” Jones said. “I didn’t know what he meant by ‘raised’ at the time. He said, ‘I eventually want you to meet them, but I want to make sure you’re mentally ready for that.’”

It’s at that point, Jones claims, Kelly began attempting to control minute aspects of her life – including requesting that she text him to ask to go to the bathroom – and she had to “stand up and greet daddy” every time he was in her presence.

Jones confronted Kelly on the phone about accusations of child abuse images, which surfaced in February 2002 and saw the singer indicted on multiple charges – he was found not guilty on 14 counts. When Jones later met Kelly at the airport, she says, the singer became violent and turned into a “monster”, slapping her repeatedly.

“I was putting my hand over my face and telling him I was sorry,” Jones says. “He would start kicking me, telling me I was a stupid bitch [and] don’t ever get in his business.”

Jones says the abuse continued but calmed down when Kelly took her on the 2012 Single Ladies Tour, where he featured Jones in a part of the show in which she appeared chained to a white cage as Kelly simulated oral sex on her.

“I think he knew leading up to the tour that I was just over it,” she said. “He knew that I was holding all these secrets that I had learned being in the inner circle and that I could probably be the one to nail him. So him taking me on that tour was like, ‘Let me make sure I treat this one a certain way.’”

Jones says that after Kelly moved to New York, she was made to live with two other girlfriends who were punished for attempting to leave his apartment – with constant monitoring and instructions that Kelly’s male staff were not to interact with them.

Jones says she eventually left in 2013 and that Kelly initially didn’t react badly to her move, but the next time they met, she alleges that he attacked her.

Jones’s allegations follow a report earlier this year in which five women spoke about similar controlling behaviour and abuse by the singer, who has denied both their account and Jones’s.

After Kelly was acquitted of the child abuse image charges, he settled out of court following other accusations of underage sex, and allegedly had an illegal marriage to his fellow R&B star Aaliyah when she was 15. The 50-year-old Kelly is one of the most successful R&B artists of all time, with tens of millions of album sales.