R. Kelly trial: ex-girlfriend says singer's manager suggested they kill her over incriminating sex tape

Lisa Van Allen first faced cross-examination from Beau Brindley, attorney for former R. Kelly business manager Derrel McDavid.

Brindley focused on Van Allen's testimony in which she said she had watched a sex tape showing Kelly, herself, and Jane with McDavid. Van Allen walked back on watching the tape at a lawyer's office and said she did not remember what she said to law enforcement, but she said she did watch the tape with McDavid.

Brindley argued that the reason the lawyer's office had disappeared from Van Allen's testimony was that the tape was never handed over to McDavid. Van Allen pushed back on continued implications that McDavid was not there and did not watch the tape.

Brindley then brought up money he argued Van Allen had made off Kelly, including a book. Van Allen acknowledged she wrote a book about her life and Kelly was a big part of it as they dated nine years, but she said while Kelly gave her money, she did not make money of him.

Van Allen said she also appeared in the Lifetime documentary "Surviving R. Kelly" to raise awareness.

Brindley went on to address sex involving Kelly and video recordings. Van Allen said she had also had threesomes with Kelly and adult women in addition to the one with then-14-year-old Jane – and she said she knew Kelly was recording the threesomes.

She said she took the tape showing Kelly, herself, and Jane because she did not want Kelly watching the tape – and her intention was never to have it "out in the media." When Brindley said Van Allen could have destroyed the tape, Van Allen said such a thing had never crossed her mind.

She acknowledged that she instead sent the tape out of state to Keith Murrell, who in turn had a relationship with Charles Freeman – the man who was hired to retrieve tapes that might be incriminating to Kelly and who said he sued when he was not paid in full.

Van Allen testified earlier that she found the tape showing herself, Kelly, and Jane when left alone in Kelly's studio with the tapes in a duffel bag. She said it contained three scenes – the first just showing Kelly and Jane in a room with a black and white floor as he gave her water so she would pee, the second showing Jane in a bedroom, and the third showing all three of them in a log cabin room.

Brindley made repeated reference to Van Allen having "stolen" this tape, and also questioned the sequence of scenes on the tape based on what Van Allen had said in "Surviving R. Kelly" versus how she described it in testimony.

Van Allen said those behind "Surviving R. Kelly" had changed the order of her words.

Brindley also said before 2008, Van Allen had said she had never seen a tape with just Jane and Kelly – only with all three of them.

Van Allen said she did not take the tape with the intent of getting money from Kelly – but Brindley, using the word "theft" to characterize her taking possession of the tape, said Van Allen had indicated that she wanted to get the tape back to Kelly – but also didn't want him watching it.

Brindley also brought up testimony by Van Allen on McDavid refusing to give her money for the tape. Brindley also questioned Van Allen's timeline on McDavid's alleged threat against her.

Lisa Van Allen, a former girlfriend of R. Kelly's, testified Thursday that the singer's onetime business manager told her in 2007 that they should have killed her instead of paying her to return a videotape showing Kelly having sex with her and his 14-year-old goddaughter.

Van Allen has testified she had threesomes three times with Kelly and his goddaughter, identified in court only as "Jane" in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and that after finding one of the tapes in Kelly's duffel bag, she gave it to a friend in Kansas City, and Kelly later offered her $250,000 to give it back in 2007, as he was preparing to face trial on child pornography charges in Cook County.

Kelly, McDavid, and the singer's former assistant, Milton "June" Brown, are on trial for charges accusing them of intimidating and pressuring witnesses in that trial in order to cover up incriminating sex tapes and fix his 2008 trial, at which he was acquitted.

Van Allen said, after two earlier meetings at which she passed lie detector tests, and was paid a total of $70,000 for returning the tape she had found, McDavid told her at a meeting in July 2007 that she'd get the rest of the money after the trial, and continued to blame her for having to pay out any money at all.

After telling her she had failed a third lie detector test, McDavid told her "they should've murked me from the beginning," testifying it was her understanding that meant they should have killed her.

"I never knew they were thinking about killing me," she testified.

After that, McDavid directed her to make a false statement to an attorney, denying she ever had sex with Jane. Van Allen testified she went along because she was afraid.

Van Allen testified against Kelly at his 2008 trial, telling that jury that Kelly videotaped her having sex with him and the 14-year-old Jane. She told the jury at his federal trial in Chicago that she testified against Kelly in 2008 because she was afraid, because they "said they should've murked me from the beginning and I had a daughter."

Lisa Van Allen, a former girlfriend of R. Kelly's, testified Thursday the singer offered to pay her $250,000 to return a tape showing the two of them having sex with his underage goddaughter nearly 20 years ago.

Van Allen, now 42, testified she first met Kelly in 1998, through her cousin. At the time, she said Kelly asked her if she had a boyfriend, how old she was, and whether her mom would let her come to Chicago. She told Kelly her mother would let her come to Chicago, and that she was 17 years old, although she was actually 18.

"At the time, that's what I thought was truthful," she testified.

Van Allen said she had sex with Kelly in his trailer, and then he went to finish a shoot, while she stayed in the trailer. Afterward they exchanged phone numbers, and Kelly told her to call him.

When she called him a month later, he asked her to come see him in Chicago, and put her in touch with his assistant, Milton "June" Brown, who is now on trial alongside Kelly. Van Allen said Brown sent her money to travel to Chicago, and picked her up at the airport in a limo, then took her to a hotel, and later to the singer's studio.

Kelly and Van Allen spent les than a week together, eating together, listening to music, talking, and having sex, before she went back to Atlanta, Van Allen testified.

After that, she would regularly visit Kelly, having sex a few times a day, with Kelly recording on videotape when they would have threesomes, but not when it was just the two of them.

Van Allen said Kelly wouldn't allow her to speak to other men in his presence, and wouldn't allow men to speak to her. 

After she moved to Chicago, Kelly hit her, "because I didn't listen to daddy," Van Allen testified.

During her time with Kelly, Van Allen said she met a young girl, identified in court only as "Jane," who Kelly claimed was his 16-year-old neighbor. 

Jane, now a 37-year-old woman, also has testified at trial that Kelly sexually assaulted her hundreds of times between the ages of 14 and 18, and often videotaped them having sex.

Van Allen said she, Kelly, and Jane had sex three times over the next few years. She said the first time was in a log cabin-themed room, with Kelly recording the encounter on videotape, and directing her and Jane how to behave.

The second time, according to Van Allen, was on a basketball court, and Kelly became upset when she began crying, asking her "what am I gonna do with this?" as if the footage wouldn't be good to watch if she was crying.

Asked why she went ahead with the threesome with Kelly and Jane, Van Allen said, "because he asked me to."

Van Allen said the third time they all had sex was in Kelly's trailer, but they were interrupted by Kelly's publicist, and Kelly told Jane to run and hide in the bathroom while she was still naked, but didn't tell Van Allen to hide.

Van Allen testified she learned out years later that Jane actually must have been 14 at that time, because in 2000, Jane told her "she would get a PT cruiser on her 16th birthday." Van Allen said she had already been told two years before that that Jane was 16.

"She was 14. She had to be 14," she said.

Van Allen said she never wanted to take part in the threesomes, but once she learned Jane's real age, it stopped.

Van Allen said Kelly kept the tapes of their threesomes in a duffel bag, describing a time in 2000 when Kelly left her alone with the tapes in his studio. She said she opened the bag to look for the tape with her on it, popping the tapes into a VCR, and seeing Kelly with multiple women and girls, including the three encounters between her, Kelly, and Jane.

Van Allen testified she felt "disgusted" going through the tapes.

"VHS tapes are big, loud, noisy," she said, adding she feared Kelly "would walk in the room" as she was going through the tapes.

"I was sneaking," she said.

Van Allen said she took the tape of her with Kelly and Jane and sent it to her friend, Keith Murrell, in Kansas City, and didn't want Kelly to know she had the tape.

After leaving Chicago in 2001 to move back to Atlanta, neither Kelly, Brown, nor the singer's business manager Derrel McDavid asked about the videotape until 2007, according to Van Allen.

At the time, Kelly was facing an upcoming trial on child pornography charges in Cook County, and Van Allen said she'd heard the tape might have been for sale, and should get back to Kelly, because "he had the most to lose."

After that, Kelly asked her to come back to Chicago, and they met at his home in south suburban Olympia Fields, where he asked her to take off her clothes and get into his pool, where he offered her $250,000 for the tape, and told her to deal with McDavid moving forward, Van Allen testified.

She later met up with McDavid, Brown, and a polygraph administrator in March 2007, and after watching the tape she had taken from Kelly, expected to get the full $250,000 she was offered, because she passed a lie detector test about the tape, but instead McDavid only gave her $20,000. Van Allen testified McDavid explained she would get the rest of the money once they knew they had all the tapes she had given to Murrell.

Later, McDavid gave her another $50,000 and gave Murrell $80,000. Van Allen said McDavid explained he gave her less, because it was her fault they had to pay out any money for the tape in the first place.

R. Kelly's former girlfriend, Lisa Van Allen, took the witness stand on Thursday, testifying she had sex with Kelly and his underage goddaughter, three times, and the singer recorded them on video each time.

Van Allen, who also testified against Kelly at his 2008 trial on child pornography charges in Cook County, at which he was acquitted, said she first met Kelly in 2008, when she was 18, although she told Kelly she was 17. 

"At the time, that's what I thought was truthful" she said.  

She said, after she moved to Chicago, Kelly abused her and hit her, "because I didn't listen to daddy."

Van Allen, now 42, said she later met Kelly's goddaughter, "Jane," in 1998. "Jane," who already has testified against Kelly at his federal trial in Chicago, would have been around 14 years old at the time, but Van Allen testified Kelly told her she was 16, and was his neighbor.

The three of them had sex together three times in the years after they met, and Kelly recorded each encounter, later putting the tapes in a duffel bag, Van Allen testified.

Van Allen is expected to testify later that Kelly offered her money to recover one of the tapes after it went missing.

Thursday's testimony began with polygraph expert Lawrence Beaumont, who testified about lie detector tests he gave to Kelly's ex-girlfriend, Lisa Van Allen, and her friend, Keith Murrell, regarding missing tapes.

Prosecutors have said Van Allen is on videotape having sex with Kelly and a 14-year-old girl.

Beaumont testified Van Allen passed two of the three lie detector tests he administered ahead in 2007, and Murrell passed one of two tests, all ahead of Kelly's 2008 trial on child pornography charges, at which he was acquitted.

Two other polygraph experts testified earlier during the trial about lie detector tests they gave as Kelly's team was trying to recover missing tapes.