R. Kelly has been in serious trouble this year with the reemergence of allegations against him for sex-related crimes. A recent scandal involved his super sketchy marriage to then-15-year-old Aaliyah in 1994, when Kelly was 27-years-old. Earlier this month, news broke Kelly was indicted on charges of bribing a public official in order to acquire a fake ID for Aaliyah that would claim she was of age in order for the two to get married. Though Kelly has pleaded not guilty to these charges, his ex-tour manager Demetrius Smith had already declared that he would testify against his former client, as he admitted to acquiring the fake ID. Now, Smith has shared more details with TMZ about the whole ordeal.
Smith reaffirms that it was indeed his "idea" to acquire a fake ID for Aaliyah but that "Robert had nothing to do with that other than me suggesting it." However, he claimed that the ID did not have her age on it, and that he wanted to prevent the marriage from occurring. "I didn't help and assist with getting a license for him to marry Aaliyah for the purpose of being okay with it. It was to buy time, in my perspective, to make a better decision." When TMZ points out that getting an ID for Aaliyah would have likely accelerated the process of the marriage rather than delay it, Smith just repeats that the ID "didn't have her age on it," leaving us with more questions than answers. What was the function of the ID, then, anyway?
Smith dodges the question by steering the conversation towards his regret. "It was a foolish thing of me to do, man, to be assisting in it in any way...what I should have done was called Aaliyah's parents. That would have been the right thing to do." He, ultimately, just wanted to be there for his client and friend to help him make the right decisions, though it's still unclear how his actions reflected that. "I came up with Robert, it was like having a brother....I didn't want to be pushed out, and to not be able to help him in a way."