Aaliyah & Mom Diane
Tonight will be the second part of Lifetime’s docs-series, Surviving R. Kelly. While people are speaking on their relationships with Kelly, Aaliyah was mentioned as well.
One of the people speaking out is former backup singer Jovante Cunningham, who met R. Kelly at age 14. Cunningham claims she witnessed multiple sexual encounters between Kelly and underaged girls.
“We were out on the road with Aaliyah,” Cunningham said in the first episode. “On a tour bus, there really aren’t many confined spaces. … So it just so happened we were all laying in our bunks and the curtains are open, everybody’s communicating, laughing,” she continued. “When the [room] door flew open on the bus. Robert was having sex with Aaliyah.”
Diane Haughton, Aaliyah’s mom, has called this statements on behalf of Aaliyah fraudulent. The entire Haughton family has been relatively quiet in regards to the relationship between Aaliyah and Kelly, but last year, Kelly released a song and spoke on his relationship with Aaliyah.
“The woman and so-called back up singer in the forthcoming ‘Surviving’ documentary that described seeing, meeting, or ever breathing the same air as my daughter, Aaliyah, is lying and is a liar,” Haughton’s statement, which is posted from an Aaliyah instagram account. “My husband and I were always on tour with her and at interviews and every place she went throughout her entire career. Whoever this woman is, I have never seen her before anywhere on planet Earth, until now.”
“These lies and fabrications cannot be tolerated and allowed to be spewed from the forked tongue of saboteurs of Aaliyah’s legacy,” Haughton continues. “Shame on all those involved in this project who thought it kosher to drag Aaliyah’s name into a situation that has nothing to do with her today.”
Surviving R. Kelly continues tonight on Lifetime at 9/8C.
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