R. Kelly Says He Wasn’t Aware of $10.5M Lawsuit Loss Over Threat to Screen Documentary
Disgraced R&B singer R. Kelly is claiming that he wasn’t aware that a group of women were awarded $10.5 million over alleged threats that he made an attempt to cancel a screening of the docuseries Surviving R. Kelly. TMZ reports.
Per court records, Kelly said that he would have fought the lawsuit if he had known that the suit had been filed.
Additionally, Kelly claims he needs his attorneys to explain the legal documents to him because he "cannot read or understand words beyond that of a grade schooler.”
Kelly, along with Donnell Russell, his manager at the time, were hit with allegations of threatening to silence the six women who shared their accounts of their alleged encounters with the R&B singer in the Surviving R. Kelly docuseries. Kelly and Russell also allegedly threatened to take legal action against the women and producers of the docuseries.
In the latest court documents, Kelly says that Russell was never his manager and believes Russell should be held responsible for any legal action if he threatened to stop the screening because "he did that for his own reasons."
Because of the suit, Russell received a one-year sentence in 2022.
After being found guilty of racketeering and sex trafficking in 2022, Kelly is currently serving a 30-year prison sentence in North Carolina.
For his conviction of child sex crimes, he will spend another 20 years behind bars.