A woman going by the name “Jane” took the stand during R. Kelly’s federal racketeering trial in Brooklyn on Monday and Tuesday, becoming the second woman to testify against the R&B singer over his sexual abuse allegations.
The woman, who appears to be Jane Doe No. 5 of the six witnesses, said during her return to the stand Tuesday that Kelly forced her to have sex with a man he called “Nephew” as punishment, USA Today reports.
“He wanted me to please Nephew the same way I pleased him,” she said.
The witness, who is now 23, reportedly met Kelly in 2015 when she was 17 years old. He allegedly told her he would help her get a singing career. She claims Kelly recorded the sexual encounter with “Nephew,” and that there was another incident where Kelly and “Nephew” went back and forth between her room and another “girlfriend’s” room to have sex with them both. She has not had contact with the singer since January 2020.
“I was against it,” she said in court. “I told him I did not come to please him. He continued to persist.”
The day before, in her Monday testimony, “Jane” said Kelly pressured her to have sex for an audition, and that she contracted herpes from him, “purposely [giving] me something he knew he had.” She also claimed that, after meeting him on his Black Panties Tour, he coerced her into getting an abortion in 2017.
Kelly and Aaliyah’s alleged 1994 union was discussed in court previously, with Brooklyn Assistant U.S. Attorney Maria Cruz Melendez mentioning it in an opening statement. Prosecutors discussed an allegedly orchestrated plan where Aaliyah could marry him after he believed she was pregnant.
“This was, of course, a huge problem for him,” Cruz Melendez said. “If she was pregnant that meant there would be questions: At the very top of that list of questions—who is the father of that baby?”
While the identity of “Nephew” is unknown, Kelly’s lawyers previously argued in court against using allegations of Kelly abusing a 17-year-old boy and forcing him to have sex with others.
