R. Kelly silenced Aaliyah and her family through a non-disclosure agreement, following his marriage and subsequent annulment to the then 15-year-old singer.
The new allegations were made in the final installment of Lifetime’s “Surviving R. Kelly,” which aired on Jan. 2 and Jan. 3. The docuseries centered around R. Kelly’s 2022 federal trial where the NDA was brought up in the courtroom as evidence. The late Aaliyah was Jane Doe #1 in the trial.
“Surviving R. Kelly” utilizes Aaliyah’s story to spotlight her as a victim of R. Kelly, after years of the media and music industry scandalizing her marriage to the now-convicted singer in the 90’s.
Aaliyah’s debut album in 1994 was titled “Age Ain’t Nothing but a Number” and was recorded when she was 14-years-old. R. Kelly — who was Aaliyah’s mentor and was first introduced to her by her uncle, music executive and manager Barry Hankerson — was a lead songwriter and producer of the album. At the time the album was released, rumors circulated that there was a relationship between the 15-year-old Aaliyah and the 27-year-old R. Kelly.
The pair secretly married in August 1994. Aaliyah was 15 at the time, but the marriage certificate falsified her age as 18. The marriage was annulled by Aaliyah’s parents in Feb. 1995.
In “Surviving R. Kelly,” on-camera interviews with individuals from R. Kelly’s camp who were in the room when the duo wed express their regret over the marriage. Individuals who were close to both R. Kelly and Aaliyah share new details about the legal agreement that was allegedly forged between R. Kelly and Aaliyah’s family.