It's bizarre to consider why R. Kelly would be giving an interview when he's about to go on trial but apparently, he believes he is his best spokesperson. The disgraced singer was a guest on CBS This Morning, speaking with Gayle King about all the allegations made against him, from sex with underage girls to mental and physical abuse of women. For the last few weeks, Kelly has remained silent, letting his lawyer Steve Greenberg do most of the talking but now, it looks like his defense team is taking a different strategy.
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Last night, several clips from the interview were previewed after it had wrapped up, showing the singer crying and yelling uncontrollably at parts. He vehemently denies having sex with underage girls, noting that he's "beaten his case" in the past so present rumours and future rumours should not be considered. "Everybody says something bad about me," says Kelly in reference to the Surviving R. Kelly documentary. "Nobody said nothin' good. They was describing Lucifer. I'm not Lucifer. I'm a man. I make mistakes, but I'm not a devil, and by no means am I a monster." He claims that all of the accusers in the Lifetime documentary were lying on him.
He denies many times throughout his conversation with Gayle King that he has ever had sex with anybody under the age of 17, even saying that the parents of his accusers, Joycelyn Savage and Azriel Clary, "sold" their children to him.
Before that, though, he tells King that he is in a consensual relationship with both Savage and Clary. "They're my girlfriends; we have a relationship; it's real. I know guys who have five or six women, so don't go there," he says to King. As she continues to prod the topic, Kelly elaborates further on how he met the two girls and makes accusations of his own against their parents.
He claims to have met both young girls at one of his concerts, and that they were introduced strategically, by way of the parents. He also alleges that Clary's parents wanted him to have sex with her when she was underage, but he did not.
"What kind of father, what kind of mother would sell their daughter to a man?" asks Kelly. "How come it was okay for me to see them until they wasn't getting no money from it?" When King asks if Joycelyn Savage and Azriel Clary were "handed" to him by their parents, he responds, "Absolutely."
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At one point during the interview, R. Kelly actually needs to be physically restrained by an unidentified man off camera, possibly his publicist.
After he's calmed down, Kelly emotionally tells King that he just has a really big heart: "I need help," admitted the singer. "I need somebody to help me not have a big heart. My heart is so big that people keep playing me and I keep forgiving them." King quickly responds that it appears as though he is playing the victim with this statement.
Read what attorney Michael Avenatti had to say about the case here. What are your thoughts after watching the interview?
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