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R. Kelly back in court in fight over child support payments

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Dominique Gardner Details The Final Straw That Made Her Leave R. Kelly

Dominique Gardner, one of the ladies who survived R. Kelly, is giving more details about her experience with Robert and through her words, you can tell she’s still getting over her Pied Piper manipulation.

In her talk with The New Yorker, Gardner described her nine years with Kelly. At one point, she was one of six women living with him, and she even appeared in the doc Surviving R. Kelly when her mom Michelle Kramer tracked her down in L.A. to get her to leave Kelly’s “cult.”

Now, Gardner has finally escaped Kelly’s grasp and is living on the North Side of Chicago, working and saving money for her own studio apartment.

“I would probably still be there if he would have let me go to my little brother’s graduation,” she said. “I’d still be there, but, when he told me no . . . I’m, like, ‘What is wrong with you?’ You don’t let people see their families, I guess, because we might realize how much freedom and happiness we have out there with our families.”

In her talk with The New Yorker, Gardner confirmed some of the things other women have said about living with Kelly. He replaces his girlfriends’ phones with ones they could only use with him, he wouldn’t let them contact their family, he didn’t let them look or speak to other men, and he encouraged them to wear baggy gym clothes so other men wouldn’t look at them.

Gardner even confirmed that they had to ask permission to eat and go to the bathroom.

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Source: JOSHUA LOTT / Getty

Gardner said she often disobeyed him and suffered what she described as “consequences,” including spankings, slappings, beatings and being hit with an extension cord. Once, after she threw a carrot at Robert, “he grabbed me and he pulled my hair out, and I had, like, patches torn from my hair.”

Now Gardner is trying to move on from the whole experience.

“I just want to heal. I just want my privacy,” she said.

Despite all the horrible things Kelly has done to Gardner, she still doesn’t believe he should go to prison. She brings up Kelly’s past, including his alleged experience with being molested, as a reason.

“I’m not trying to defend him and what he has done, but, at the end of the day, you don’t understand what he’s been through, as a child,” Gardner said. “I feel like he should be on house arrest in a studio, because, like I said, his music makes him get through the situations, what’s he going through. Jail time, no. He needs to have a twenty-four-hour therapist at his house.”

In addressing Kelly, she finally said, “You can stop the cycle. Just be honest. People don’t want you in jail.”

Lies!

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Clearly, Gardner hasn’t hopped on social media. But we’ll let her get her healing on.

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