R. Kelly wants illiteracy used as his defense in the legal battle to avoid paying millions of dollars to six of his alleged victims who appeared in the “Surviving R. Kelly” docuseries. The three-part A&E/Lifetime production first premiered in 2019 and released its final installment of sexual abuse and harassment claims levied against the disgraced singer early last year.
A multimillion-dollar civil suit was filed against Kelly and his former manager, Donnell Russell, in 2021. The victims claim the two men launched a campaign to shut down a 2018 screening of the documentary.
Documents claimed it was an “orchestrated effort to silence, harass, bribe, and intimidate those brave young women and their friends and family” and that “defendants used escalating methods of intimidation, moving from legal to terroristic in a matter of hours” before the event. It was ultimately shut down after Russell and associates allegedly made threats to carry out a mass shooting at the NeueHouse Theater in New York City.
As a result, the individuals said they suffered from panic attacks and PTSD, which caused them to live in fear. This past August, a judge awarded the victims $10.5 million in a default judgment. The “Pied Piper” of R&B has since filed new documents arguing that if he were ever served with the suit, he could not have responded to it due to his intellectual deficits.
Wait so it wasn’t a joke R Kelly really couldn’t read ? 🫣🫠🤧
— The Celestial Sentinel (@DnellyBPD) September 26, 2023
Just as an adult I just can’t get how this can be possible in modern society outside of that I get it but how do you function being illiterate 😬 #kmichelle #rkelly #RNBMoney pic.twitter.com/i1GC6HGvU3
“I cannot read or understand words beyond that of a grade schooler,” he stated in the filing, according to TMZ. Kelly further attempts to exonerate himself from any wrongdoing in the matter by stating that Russell was never his manager and that if threats were made it was not on his behalf. “He did that for his own reasons,” said Kelly.
“We are absolutely pushing back on the $10.5 million default judgment that was entered against him without notice and without a sound legal justification,” said the singer’s attorney in a statement shared with XXL. “It would be simplistic and silly to write that the basis for our motion to vacate the windfall judgment relates solely to his illiteracy (although he is in fact functionally illiterate per formalized testing).
His statement continues, “The more significant problem is that there was no legal basis to enter the default judgment on the merits. It is not even disputed that Kelly played no role in the events that formed the basis of that lawsuit and did not even know what allegedly occurred until after the fact. He cannot as a matter of law be liable for the intentional conduct of someone who was not even his employee.”
Russell previously hit back at the illiteracy narrative on the “Early and Tia” YouTube series. He said Kelly read out a list of issues between them, exposing the “lie” about being unable to read.
“What he does is make you feel like he can’t read, so you can lie to him about something in the contract, and he acts like he can’t read it, and now he knows what kinda person you are—you just lied to him. That’s bulls—t. That’s some manipulation a— s—t. He wanna see if you’re gonna purposely lie to him about money or something in the contract. He go back and read it,” said Russell in May 2023.
He received a one-year prison sentence for sending the threats to the woman that halted the documentary’s screening. Russell has reportedly known Kelly for decades and set out to help him obtain funds to pay his legal fees. During trial he argued there was no evidence that he called the theater in New York on the day of the screening.
Stories of the “I Believe I Can Fly” artist struggling to read, write, and do math have circulated for years. As early as 2009, he was quoted as telling a concert audience, “I don’t even read really, and I’m not afraid to say that. … The only reason I graduated from grammar school is because I had a great jump shot.”
The once celebrated songwriter is currently serving a 30-year sentence in North Carolina after being convicted of racketeering in 2021 and child pornography and enticing a minor in a 2022 trial.
