I Had to Rebuild My Entire Self: Reshona Landfair on Life After R. Kelly

By Christian Amegbor
Feb Wed, 2026
in Entertainment

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Reshona Landfair in 1996, when she was 12 years old, when she met R&B star R Kelly (real name Robert Kelly). Her world, she says, was like a buffet spread out before her. She was a popular girl, a professional basketball player and the youngest member, she says, of the pint-sized rap group 4 The Cause, a group she formed with three brothers.

They were signed to a record label, had top-10 hits in eight countries and toured much of Europe.

Her large family, from Chicago’s West Side, was very close. Life was filled with music, sports, church, Sunday lunches at Kaka’s, family outings and everyone getting to know each other.

It was a good time, she says. I had love and good people around me. I was living in the true light of who I wanted to be. I felt like I was on my way.

Fast forward to Landfair when I was 26, when she left Kelly’s band. At the time, half of her family didn’t talk to the other half, and the relationships she survived were filled with guilt, unanswered questions, and major mistakes later.

She had no friends left, because Kelly hadn’t left her. Her hopes of a music career were also short-lived Kelly left 4 The Cause when she was just 15.

She didn’t have a high school diploma and didn’t know what she wanted to do because, for more than a decade, she had relied on Kelly to tell her. She couldn’t imagine a healthy relationship; she learned about sex, she says, by watching child pornography.

Every part of her 12 year old life, everything on the buffet table, Kelly had ruined. Yet strangers still told her repeatedly that she had to be a gold digger, that she had to get on a soup boat and bring Kelly everything she could get.

There shouldn’t be much to learn about Kelly’s 30 year history of abusing women and children. In 2021, he was convicted of fraud and the following year of soliciting and producing child pornography.

The third season of the documentary Surviving R Kelly has been watched by millions, and his six-week trial in 2021 was a global sensation. But those who have followed the horror story will know that one important voice has been missing: Landfair.

Her absence was particularly noticeable in the first season of Surviving R Kelly, which began in January 2019. Many of his fans, singers and dancers, and the girls he met at the supermarket and his colleagues have come forward to share their experiences.

They have been photographed, shared, beaten, broken, badly injured, and severely maimed by those who want to take them.

They were included in the film in a major confession by Kelly Sparkle’s ex-husband, who introduced him to her 12-year-old sister, a professional rapper, but they were shocked when they played together without supervision.

Sparkle’s calls to his family became a common occurrence, and Kelly took her sister’s father as her guitar player. In 2002, one of Kelly’s videos was leaked and widely circulated, showing him urinating on a young girl whom Sparkle immediately recognized as her sister, and from the texture of her hair, she knew she was only 14 at the time.

Months later, Kelly was charged with possession of child pornography. The trial took place in 2008. Sparkle testified for the prosecution but her sister refused to testify. In court, her parents denied that the girl in the video was their daughter. Kelly was cleared and the charges dismissed. That girl, of course, was Landfair.

The episode sparked an investigation weeks after it aired, and Kelly was arrested again. For Landfair, watching him was life-changing.

She didn’t like Sparkle speaking for or about her, but the rest was a shock. It made her feel uncomfortable, she says. I always thought it attraction and his attraction to me, but then I saw so many women, so many girls. It was like watching a murderer.

I didn’t know he was a big man, and I felt responsible for it. I defended him, I lied to him. Her voice cracked and the silence grew longer as she gathered herself. He could have hurt a lot of people after me.

That revelation led her to testify against Kelly in court at his 2022 trial in Chicago, and she has now written a book, Who’s Watching Shorty?, about her time with Kelly.

It all started when her aunt, Sparkle, took him to see the 4 part series of The Cause. It was amazing, she said. He was a great man in my eyes.

Kelly singled out Landfair for special praise and took the whole family out to dinner. He quickly became a family friend.

Her book described her illness, and Kelly’s voice in her ear. It began with a long, tight hug. They would call Landfair to her childhood bedroom, surrounded by sports trophies. First, there was the conversation, the school, the basketball, and then, on the floor, he started asking what she was wearing. Then he told her to touch her head.

For months, Kelly convinced herself that they had a special connection, a connection that happened once in a lifetime, and it was worth the risk for both of them.

You understood me on a level greater than anyone else and everything I’ve ever experienced, he told her. And then it would be: If you love me like I love you, then you need to do what I say, or: People do things they don’t want to do to the people they love every day of the week.

He made rules about what she wore, who she could talk to, what she could say. After a while, he was the only person she would be around. If Landfair refused to have sex with Kelly, which she called the next step or development of our love, he would punish her or call a girl from his room (a dark, windowless room) and make her do it in front of Landfair.

She knew there were many girls, but in her childhood memories, they were her rivals, not victims.

Landfair said that most of the people who were with Kelly who took care of her daily needs and brought her food must have known. These people were there every day, she said.

They had to take care of you and were like family. When I was little, I saw that as a help. Now I see them as part of it, even if they didn’t do the work.

What about her parents? Kelly always taught her to keep quiet about their questions. When Landfair left 4 The Cause, she was told to tell her parents that it was because she wanted her son to be normal.

She found it hard to blame the parents. Yes, Kelly paid her father, who died in 2021, the money she was paid. She wouldn’t have wanted to make a big enemy like that, but she said she would have looked happy.

I definitely think there were times when my parents understood spirituality and it was probably too much for them, she said.

I’m not here to hide or cover up their mistakes, but I know they did it out of love and fear of losing me.

I’m trying not to be harsh, the leaked video, made when Landfair was 14, gave them no choice but to watch. At the time, Landfair was 17. It was embarrassing, it was shameful, it was pathetic, my body was everywhere and the world could see it, she said.

It was sold on street corners, in markets fleas. The people I grew up with were “celebrating” the sight.

Her parents were devastated. by their daughter’s death, angry with Kelly, and fearful of the consequences. Under Kelly’s good guidance, Landfair threatened to kill herself if they tried to separate her from Kelly. In an emergency meeting at a Chicago hotel, Kelly begged Landfair’s father to forgive her.

He said he regretted the lie, but not out of love for their daughter, and he promised to protect her. At that point, the parents chose not to accept what the family, the police, the courts, and the jury had done.

We were just a family that didn’t want to end Robert’s career, she said. We felt more secure, Robert’s resources were more protected.

From that moment on, Landfair went into hiding. She dropped out of school to be homeschooled and left home. She was never seen again with Kelly, and instead lived in one of those dark studios, or in a small room in a car, by the pool, which was kept outside. his house.

His staff accommodated her requests, but Kelly herself was not there much. I was sad, I was alone, she said.

There were times when he remembered that he needed me on the side, so there would be a Thanksgiving dinner, or a trip, but there was nothing free at that time, nothing fun. It was a job done for his own benefit.

Kelly was still in demand despite the video, and she even appeared at the opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympics, and was at parties, games and many of the women who worked with him.

Landfair was barred from watching any news about the upcoming trial, from Google Kelly's name, or anything related to him, a law she had long lived under.

It took six years for the trial to begin in 2008, and there was no rush from the authorities. Landfair knew that the 26 minutes and 30 seconds of the video were played to everyone in the courtroom, not just the jurors. She knew people were laugh.

I "I feel like my skin color played a big role in the case and how I was treated in public, she said, then stopped, slowly wiping away her tears. I get chills when I think about it.

After Kelly was acquitted, Landfair remained in his world for years, but he was rarely there. In fact, she was replaced by other victims. She left at 26.

I was so lost, so confused, so scared, she says. I really didn’t know life and culture. I had to rebuild myself completely.

She still hasn’t seen her time with Kelly for what it was. I don’t see myself as a victim because the world didn’t,” she says. “I’m a talker. I know people call me ‘ho’ and ‘gold digger’ when they praise him and his songs.

And you divide people. If you have those moments where you’re reminded of what you went through, you push it away immediately.

She avoids reading anything about Kelly, and she certainly doesn’t talk about the years that have passed. Even watching Surviving R Kelly alone when it aired was dangerous.

I was scared. I felt like I was doing something wrong by watching it, but in the end, I felt like I had my dignity back.

Shortly after, when the Homeland Security Agency called Landfair, she told them she would fully cooperate.

Landfair did not attend Kelly’s 2021 trial, which was held in New York with 45 witnesses, resulting in a 30-year sentence for fraud and trafficking in women. She did not even attend the trial.

The trial was held a year later in Chicago, with two days of testimony from Landfair.

I washed myself in that courtroom, she said. I didn’t want to hold anything back. When she was done, she went into the dressing room, lay down on the floor, and cried.

She said it felt spiritual, like oil was coming out of my body, the poison was gone. This was my moment of freedom. For the first time, I was not under his spell. Kelly was sentenced to 20 years, 19 of which will be 30 years.

The recovery has been slow but steady. Landfair now has a five-year-old son. She works for a non-profit organization that supports single mothers, and for a school health program. “I’m still on the road to getting my life back on track,” she says, “but I’m a long way off.”

She still thinks about Kelly, even though she tries not to. Why does he do such terrible things? Landfair doesn’t believe it’s about sex. She says it’s about power.

Although he has a strong sexual drive and lust, what makes him happy is that he can get whatever he wants, make you do bad things and submit to him in every way possible.

Kelly has spoken publicly about being sexually abused as a child, starting at the age of seven.

I wish he had used his grown-up mind, his money, and his power to seek professional help, or to raise awareness and help others, Landfair said. Instead, when I entered the courtroom, he gave me a look that told me he still didn't understand," she said. It wasn't a look of regret. It was a look that said, 'Hmph, how did you get here ?

When I think of Robert now, Landfair said, there are times when I feel angry, times when I feel sad, but ultimately, I hope he finds it. Maybe he has now.

His recent statements, since he contacted Rolling Stone magazine in response to its book, through his lawyer, suggest otherwise: As a young woman, Ms. Landfair was forced into the public eye illegally by people intent on tarnishing R. Kelly's reputation. She didn't deserve it.

Mr. Kelly has nothing bad to say about her. He wishes her success and peace.

I'm still very scared, she said. I didn't want to use too much information when I was scared. I just focused on what was in front of me.