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[interviewer] Now, what would you consider to be
the most difficult aspect of your career?
The most difficult aspect is
controlling myself around the ladies, man.
I just be ridiculous because I love them so much.
I be like, yo. [laughs]
Having fun, seeing all the girls,
basically. [laughs] You know?
[Chris] It was great to come out and show the world
how to be a gentleman and try to have fun.
He's not going to do anything like this in the future.
If you're not my fan, then don't listen to my music.
I'm not asking you to.
[paparazzo] When is your hearing
for your restraining order?
We have a woman that called for help
around three o'clock this morning.
[announcer] The winner of the four BET Awards,
Mr. Chris Brown.
[woman] How do you feel? Do you feel like a man?
No, I have not spoken about this matter publicly.
[Clarence] We had Hit Mission Music Production.
Our mission is to write hits, just not songs, but hit songs.
My name is Clarence Jenkins,
and I am a retired schoolteacher and military,
and I'm an executive producer of Hit Music music company.
This particular plaque right here
is for the project that went double platinum.
That's the first album, entitled Chris Brown.
In 2002, 2003,
we were actually looking for talent.
So a rapper brought my partner a CD.
He was like, you know, "Hey, Lamont. I got this CD."
He was like, "I'd like for you to check me out."
[Clarence] I listened to it.
It was okay, but nothing that kind of spinned my wheels
to make me say, "I want to invest money and time into it."
But we heard a voice in the background.
The way I heard his vibrato
and the way the song was coming off,
like he's very mature.
He reminded me of Michael Jackson.
I said, "Huh. Who is that?"
Ever since I was two, I always was dancing
and performing, always.
But, like, I guess I would have to say
I was around 11 or 12 when I found out I could sing.
Chris Brown was young when he was discovered.
He was 14. Good-looking.
He could dance, he could sing.
We produced the first music video
and the record.
I would put my own talent shows together.
Chris Brown spoke.
I remember I wasn't initiating.
But I was going to the same thing with Lamont.
"Sing, boy, sing! Get him to sing..."
That was the early Chris, the innocent Chris,
the beginning of his career.
So we submitted this demo to the record label.
And the rest is history.
[radio host] Chris Brown is the name. Get used to that right there.
[Michelle] I remember when he first came out,
I was like, "Who is this little kid?"
[Scaachi] He's a baby.
He's got such a baby face.
They don't have like regular chairs.
They have couches.
You get to relax and lean back.
The story around Chris Brown very much was that
he was going to be the next Michael Jackson.
[Michelle] I saw him in the film This Christmas.
He had such charisma. Like, he draws you in.
About 15 years ago,
I was working for BET News.
I'd go on 106 & Park
and I would cover the music industry,
big stories that would happen.
At 15 years old,
the rest of us are hanging out in the mall.
Chris Brown is signing record deals
and he is making records,
and Run It! was released.
It went to number one.
He was actually the first male artist
to have a debut single reach number one
on the Billboard charts for 10 years.
Oh, it's great. It's great. I'm having fun.
Everything we're doing, just having fun.
For a couple of years, his music was everywhere.
In 2007, Wrigley's actually
signed a deal with Chris Brown for Doublemint gum.
They actually paid for him to go in the studio
and create a full-length song from that jingle,
which was Forever.
♪♪ One, two, three, four! ♪
[Scaachi] It went viral.
After this wedding procession,
he was dancing down the aisle to this Chris Brown song.
And then The Office ended up using this dance
in one of their episodes when Jim and Pam get married.
So he had really cornered this very particular piece
of pop culture ubiquity just from one song.
You've got stars and then you've got superstars.
What Chris had was the talent
and the presence and the work ethic
and the confidence to be an absolute superstar.
One more. One more. She wasn't in.
He spoke to female audiences.
[man] That's the type of stuff that will get you into trouble, player!
For the young ladies,
I mean, what's up, man? You got a girl or what?
Nah, I'm keeping my options open.
So y'all be checking for me.
You know what I'm saying?
[host] Rihanna, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you.
Yes, ma'am? Go right ahead.
[woman] It seems like you just came from nowhere.
Everything is a big deal for me
because I was just a normal girl growing up in Barbados,
doing normal things.
And, now, there's just so many things happening.
[Michelle] Robyn Fenty, also known as Rihanna,
she's from Barbados,
makes it big in the United States
and around the world.
[Sharon] She went from being the girl next door
with "Pon de Replay" and "SOS,"
and then came out with this new edgy Rihanna.
And people really loved it.
And she was pushing the boundaries.
In 2005, Rihanna and Chris Brown
were actually photographed backstage
at the Z100 Jingle Ball.
They both were kind of like exploding onto this scene
and making these really fun songs
that people could dance to and vibe with.
[Sharon] So these two young stars struck up a friendship,
and they really hit it off.
We're not sure when that friendship became romantic,
because for the longest time,
they were trying to convince us all,
"No, we're just platonic. No, we're just friends."
But one really, really big and special moment for them
was at the MTV Awards 2007.
They were 18, 19.
Chris Brown had this amazing performance,
bounding from the stage to different platforms,
and the audience is just like, "Wow!"
[crowd cheering]
The curtain opens
and there's a silhouette of this gorgeous woman
with legs for days.
And it's Rihanna.
And everyone goes absolutely nuts.
You could feel the chemistry between the two of them,
especially from Chris,
and we all wanted them to be together.
And then eventually we found out that they were a couple.
Fans were really excited to see
the pop prince and princess together.
I was like, "Yes, we love this.
This is going to be fun.
This is going to be great."
It's tough to still play the game of, like,
"Oh, they were a power couple.
They were so beautiful. They were so charming.
They were so well matched."
He still hit her in that car.
The Grammys, 2009, was probably going to be
the biggest night of their lives, actually.
They were 19 and 20,
Chris was up for two Grammy Awards,
and he was going to hit the stage.
Rihanna was up for three Grammy Awards,
and she was going to hit the stage
with Justin Timberlake.
And there were photographs of Chris Brown
with Rihanna at a party the night before.
They had left together in Chris' rented Lamborghini.
I'm Cheryl Dorsey, a 20-year veteran
of the Los Angeles Police Department.
I didn't really know about Chris
and Rihanna's dating relationship.
I'm a different generation,
and so that wasn't anything that I was really tracking.
Until around 12:40 in the morning.
There was a call to dispatch 911 of an assault.
[dispatcher] 17. Unit 17, come in.
[unit 17] All right, copy. Rolling.
It was somebody in the Hancock Park area
who had heard a woman continuously
screaming for help.
[Cheryl] The incident report states Chris and Rihanna
were driving in his little Lamborghini around town,
Rihanna had seen something on his phone
that made her think that he was dealing with another female.
And by his own admission,
when she confronted him in the car,
he kind of got a little annoyed with her.
So the nerve of her to have the temerity
to talk to him and ask him and question him
about whatever it is that he's doing.
[Sharon] Chris tried to shove her out of the car,
open the car door, and get her out of the car.
She had her seatbelt on, so that didn't work.
Then he punched her in the eye.
He punched her in the left eye.
He's driving, punching her with his right fist
as he drives with his left hand.
And this goes on for blocks.
And he kept punching her,
and her mouth was filling up with blood.
Chris Brown had said to her,
"I'm gonna beat the S-H-I-T out of you."
She tried to call her assistant.
Her assistant didn't answer the phone.
So she pretended that she had
and that she was on the phone with her,
and she said, "Please make sure the police are there
when I get home."
Likely, she was hoping
that this would get Chris to calm down
and sort of come to his senses.
But when she said that, he said...
So he grabs her phone
to prevent her from calling anybody else
to report what's going on inside that vehicle.
[Sharon] He then put her in a choke hold,
and it was so tight
that she began to lose consciousness.
[Cheryl] She now starts gouging at his eyes.
[Sharon] He bit her fingers.
And it's at that point that she's able, probably,
to get enough air to just start screaming
as loud as she can to alert neighbors.
[Sharon] He pulled over,
and that's when Rihanna sort of saw her chance.
She grabbed the keys.
She sat on the keys,
but acted like she'd thrown them out the window.
He couldn't find the keys, so he just left.
So the photos of Rihanna's face after the assault
were released-- they were leaked by LAPD,
which they're not supposed to do that.
Every woman who has been the target
of any sort of violence,
she should have the right to release the details
that she wants to release.
[Scaachi] The thing that was most shocking about it
was how brutal it looked.
She had two large knots
on either side of her forehead.
She had what looked like a cut
under one of her eyes.
[Michelle] Her lip was busted and bruised.
She sustained other injuries to her face
as a result of her head being smashed
repeatedly against the window.
[Sharon] The entire world realized at that point that
there was a darker side to Chris Brown.
There was a more sinister side to Chris Brown.
Chris Brown said himself
he was public enemy number one.
[Carolyn] I teach courses on family violence.
When I unpack the Chris Brown-Rihanna situation
and the domestic violence in my class,
it's important that we understand
that domestic violence doesn't come from nowhere.
It doesn't just happen out of anywhere.
And the question is really not "What's wrong with you?"
but "What happened to you?"
[Sharon] Chris is from a small, little town
called Tappahannock in Virginia
with a population of 2,000 people.
He was very close to his biological parents.
But things began to change for Chris
when his parents split
and his mother got remarried to his stepfather.
Even before what happened with Rihanna,
Chris had done an interview
speaking about how his mother dealt with abuse
at the hands of his stepfather.
[interviewer] I want to talk about your childhood.
[Chris] I don't want to mention the person's name,
but like somebody that hurt my mom.
From the age of like seven all the way to like thirteen,
me seeing that and being, you know what I'm saying,
like, visually abused by it.
Trauma.
But he's talking really very candidly
about the trauma that he experienced.
Chris says that there were many times
that he saw his stepfather beating on his mother.
[Sharon] And it was so bad at times, he would pee on himself
because he was too scared to go down the hallway
to go to the bathroom.
Scared to get up. You know,
I was scared to get up and see what was going on...
What struck me is what we call intergenerational trauma.
Being exposed to domestic violence early in life
can make it difficult for you to have the skill set
to have healthy relationships later in life.
[Sharon] After he assaulted Rihanna,
originally, Chris was charged with felony assault
and with making criminal threats.
The cultural perception of Chris Brown
just squished in an instant.
[growls] Chris Brown makes me angry.
But there are some people who feel
that they have to protect him at all costs.
[Omarosa] I don't know what was going on
in the dynamics of that relationship,
but I will say this. In this country,
you're innocent until proven guilty.
[Sharon] Rihanna ended up getting back with him
three weeks after the assault.
That's really not the choice that I would have made
if I were her.
I think that he still needs a lot of help
and she needs to move on with her life.
They were actually spotted in Miami,
spending time together at Diddy's house.
Diddy is a rap mogul.
He owns a lot of companies.
Chris, he has a history with Diddy.
[Sharon] At around 12 years old,
Chris had the opportunity, interestingly enough,
to audition for Diddy.
It didn't go so well.
Diddy didn't sign him.
Now, what's interesting about this
is that when you listen to Diddy's account,
he said that he invited Chris and Rihanna
to come to his home
to have some time to work through things.
One thing we didn't realize at the time
was that Rihanna had seen her mother be abused
at the hands of her dad.
[Rihanna] I couldn't separate him as a husband,
of him as a father.
-Was he violent? -Yes, he was.
[Carolyn] What I learned from that interview,
he was a wonderful father to Rihanna.
And that's what I would want individuals
to understand about domestic violence,
is that perpetrators aren't terrible all of the time.
And so that is really
what makes it hard for victims to leave,
because that's confusing.
[Sharon] Chris put out a statement
saying that he was so sorry for what he had done
and telling interviewers and journalists
what had happened that night.
How do you react to that?
I don't-- like, I just look at him like,
"Wow, like, I'm in shock."
Because, first of all, that's not who I am as a person.
[Carolyn] When he appeared on Larry King,
he's saying things,
"I don't really recall what happened,"
or almost like he's describing an out-of-body experience.
He's minimizing the abuse.
[Larry] Do you remember doing it?
No.
So he does not remember hitting Rihanna.
Is this what he's saying, that he doesn't remember?
You don't remember doing it?
I don't-- I don't...
It's like...
It's crazy to me. Like, I just-- I'm like, "Wow."
Being a 20-year attorney who's probably been involved
in at least 150 cases regarding domestic violence...
for a non-weapon physical assault
on a domestic partner,
that was one of the worst I've seen.
So, afterwards, Chris goes to court.
And during the sentencing phase,
Rihanna revealed that this wasn't the first time
Chris had abused her.
She alleged that one time in Europe,
Chris shoved her into a wall during an argument.
And another time in Barbados,
the two of them got in a fight,
and he smashed both passenger windows of their car.
He ended up getting five years' probation
and around six months of community labor.
[Freddy] The reason why you're on felony probation,
the court is putting you on notice.
Do not [bleep] up.
[Sharon] His career was impacted and he lost sponsorship deals.
Wrigley's ended up completely severing ties with him.
That's a lot of money gone at that point.
Also, the dairy industry had a Got Milk? campaign with Chris Brown,
and they wanted him to no longer be a part of that.
So that shows you a lot of people
just didn't want to support his music
at that point in time.
Before the assault, his sophomore album,
it went four times platinum.
But in 2009, Chris released his third studio album,
and it's largely considered a bit of a flop, to be honest,
by Chris Brown standards.
With the other two going multi-platinum,
this one barely went gold.
[Scaachi] But Chris Brown, like any celebrity,
has that entire infrastructure around them all the time.
There's not just their money,
but they make money for a bunch of other people.
There's a host of executives who are making even more money
off of them being there and them working.
So they have a vested interest.
They want to figure out a way
to bring this man back into the fold.
When Michael Jackson died,
BET was doing a memorial for him.
[Michelle] Of course, we're all thinking
who's going to do a Michael Jackson tribute?
A lot of his fans were like, "He's our Michael Jackson."
So it did make sense that BET would have him
come in to do a tribute.
But at the same time,
what signal is this sending to, you know,
survivors and victims of intimate partner violence?
Famous people are always protected.
We've heard this before.
We know it exists.
We've been talking about it since Tina Turner.
We've seen Megan Thee Stallion limping
and bleeding in the street
after being shot by Tory Lanez.
We see Rihanna's battered and bruised face,
and we tend to believe in this culture
that you get a pass.
[Scaachi] Chris Brown, what I think is interesting
is that BET called him to do this performance
after Michael Jackson died,
and then Chris is singing "Man in the Mirror,"
and he's crying.
[singing, voice breaking]
Chris sort of takes this as an opportunity
to pantomime emotions in public.
He might be crying naturally,
but the reality is that he's choosing a venue
and a situation to sing and cry at and during
when he knows people will watch it.
These are choices.
These are intentional.
[Keri on video] I'm so glad that, you know,
people are finally forgiving him
and finally, you know, accepting him back
into our good graces.
He deserves a second chance.
Reminded me of R. Kelly after all this stuff had come out about him.
He goes and curry favor with people.
[Dorsey] After he goes off stage,
and then he comes back
after he's kind of gathered himself, and says...
I just want to say one thing.
I let you all down before, but I won't do it again.
I promise.
I call bullshit.
[Carpenter] And Rihanna, I think she surprised some people.
Come to find out Rihanna is actually dating Chris Brown again.
And a really interesting night was the Grammy Awards 2013.
They sat front row together.
Some of the fans were really excited
to see the pop prince and princess back together again.
It was almost like they were trying to recreate
the night that was supposed to happen in 2009.
There was one problem, though.
Chris Brown was dating another woman.
[Koul] Everyone knows everything about Rihanna.
People know far less about Karrueche Tran.
Karrueche is a great example
of what it would have looked like if Rihanna had not been famous.
[Carpenter] This was the year after the Rihanna assault.
Karrueche was working for Nordstrom at the time,
and she had dreams of being a celebrity stylist.
Then one day she actually had the opportunity to style a celebrity,
Chris Brown.
And then, shortly after, they started dating.
She was around 22 years old.
[reporters clamoring]
Now suddenly she's thrust into the limelight,
and it's all eyes on her and paparazzi following her.
I've never dated celebrities.
Maybe one day, we were going to get married and have kids.
We talked about starting a family, so...
She's so hopeful that he'll mature.
He'll grow into the person that you hope that he can be.
And that you're willing to wait and sacrifice yourself.
There was one problem, though.
At one point, Chris was with Karrueche,
and then he started dating Rihanna again.
And at one point was dating them both at the same time.
[reporter] There was a rumor that you guys had broken up.
You guys are all cool, right?
[Carpenter] Karrueche said in an interview
that there was one time she was at home with Chris,
and he said he was going to pop out to go to the store.
She turns on the television,
and he's courtside with Rihanna.
Not long after, Rihanna called it off,
and then Chris went back to Karrueche.
She was somebody who really stuck by his side through a lot.
In 2013, he assaulted a man outside the W Hotel.
Chris was taking a picture with two women,
and this man tried to jump in the photo.
And then Chris punched him and broke his nose.
But Chris violated his probation in that situation,
and he spent about two, three months in jail.
Because of that, he checked himself
into a rehab facility for anger management.
But Chris Brown ended up getting kicked out.
Two weeks in, Chris had had a family session,
and Chris wanted to leave, and his mother said,
"No, I'd like it if you stay in rehab, to stick with it."
Chris went outside, according to a report,
picked up a rock and threw the rock at his mother's car window
and broke her window.
If you can treat your mother like this,
I'm not surprised that you treat other people this way.
[Carpenter] A probation officer
actually convinced the judge to keep him on probation
and in rehab for a little longer.
Chris was sent to another rehab.
They did a series of tests,
and they found out that Chris had bipolar disorder and also PTSD.
Which I'm assuming
stemmed back to what happened in his childhood.
[West] People are more than their diagnosis.
And we can't use that as an excuse
or justification for abuse.
You're still responsible for what you do
in terms of harming other people.
[Carpenter] Chris and Karrueche dated for about four years.
I know that Karrueche and Chris
had discussed having their own baby at some point.
[Koul] But then, in 2015, Chris and Karrueche broke up
because Chris got another woman pregnant and she had a baby.
He was very angry about their breakup.
He was harassing her over text.
[reporter] How was it hanging out with Chris Brown?
How was it hanging out with Chris Brown again?
[Carpenter] According to a Billboard investigative report,
every night he was checking her social media,
allegedly, to try to track down where she was,
what she was doing, who she was with.
There's a video,
and it shows Chris and Karrueche walking together.
[paparazzi clamoring]
Now the paparazzi are saying,
"Oh, are you guys back together?"
And then I'm like, "Wait, what's happening here?
Why is the friend arguing with him?"
[Carpenter] And I realized, "Hold on,
did Chris just turn up at the club
and try to get in the car without her approval?"
[Koul] Chris posted this video on Instagram.
Guess what? I wanted to [bleep].
If I love you, bitch, ain't nobody gonna have you.
I'mma make you miserable.
I'mma chase that [bleep] out.
I'mma chase your ass around.
That kind of sentiment,
men say it all the time. They think it's romantic.
It's not. It's creepy.
It's weird. It's scary.
[reporter] When is your hearing for your restraining order?
[Dorsey] In 2017, she comes forward
and she tries to get a domestic violence
restraining order.
One of the things that she said that Chris had done
was punched her,
had threatened her friends.
You know, anybody who might come to her aid.
[Carpenter] We found out about him sending the text saying,
"I'm gonna beat the S-H-I-T out of you."
It makes you think of Rihanna
because that's exactly what he said to Rihanna in the car that night.
[Koul] In the end, Karrueche's restraining order was granted.
For me, these are all signs of patterns of abuse, continued behavior.
His anger is not managed.
He's still out of control.
And if you cross him, there's a price to pay.
[Sayegh] I looked at most of his criminal history,
and he's got a 15-year history
of nearly every year of his life
being involved in reported violence of some sort.
After his relationship with Rihanna,
Chris Brown breaks things on Good Morning America.
And he also punched a man.
[Sayegh] That same year, my client got rear-ended
and he starts flipping out.
"[bleep] you, bitch! You know who the [bleep] I am?
You think you got money, bitch?"
He gets into the vehicle and takes off,
creating now the misdemeanor hit and run.
[Koul] He's accused of harassing Karrueche Tran repeatedly.
He's been sued by his own management for assault.
[Carpenter] There was a report that Chris' tour manager quit
because Chris had flown into an angry rage
and threatened her.
I didn't know that Chris Brown had allegedly beat up
so many people.
[Sayegh] When you look to what he's done,
whether it's throwing a chair
or causing some serious domestic violence action against Rihanna,
all avoidable.
All avoidable.
[Carpenter] But there's a long list of various different women
who have accused Chris Brown of assaulting them.
[police radio chatter]
In 2015, Chris was accused of assaulting a woman.
-[man] Hey! -[woman speaking]
[man speaking]
This woman found out
that Chris was doing a music video shoot.
She was hanging out at the club.
Then a member of Chris' entourage
apparently approached her and said,
"Hey, you want to come and hang out with the group that's with Chris Brown?"
She said, "Yes."
[man speaking]
[woman speaking]
She says two bodyguards grabbed her
and then threw her off the bus.
[woman crying]
[man] You seem pretty upset.
Are you sure you don't want me to call a victim's advocate to have 'em come talk to you?
[Koul] Chris was named as a person of interest in the alleged assault.
And in response, he posts on social media,
and then his fans immediately jumped on it
to discredit the accuser.
-[fan 1] Get a job. -[fan 2] Can you say "groupie"?
[fan 3] She's known as a liar.
[fan 4] The whole claim was bogus.
[official] Hey.
[official speaking]
[woman speaking]
She ended up dropping the case
because people tracked her down on social media.
You know, perpetrators just don't groom the victim.
They groom other people too.
He has enough of a market share
that he can have an audience
full of sympathetic assault deniers.
[excited fan chatter]
[Carpenter] There are a number of big superstars
who have a very diehard fan base.
Their core fans.
You've got Beyonce's Beehive,
you've got Nicki Minaj's Barbies,
Rihanna's Navy.
And oftentimes,
men don't have fan bases
who are quite as diehard
as some of the female stars do.
But Chris Brown does.
[excited fan chatter]
Why would teenagers sort of side with Chris Brown?
What I found is that if you are exposed to violence in your community,
if you're exposed to violence in your home,
you don't label or see the violence in the same way
because it is normalized all around you.
On top of it is a ongoing, culturally exhausting,
endless well of hatred that we have for women.
If people think that you deserve it,
then that's how they're gonna talk to you.
If people think that you were asking for it,
that's how they're gonna treat you.
If you have any inclination towards fame,
they'll find it and they'll run at you with it.
You have to have all of these structures and these pieces
put into place perfectly
so that an audience believes your performance of victimhood.
[Gutierrez] I'm originally from Brazil.
I came to Las Vegas almost 15 years ago.
I was in the backstage at Chris Brown's concert.
I was there with my friend.
The show was about to finish.
Chris Brown's friend come and talk to me like,
"Hey, we're trying to get some girls
to go with us to the after party.
Would you like to go?"
I was like, "Yeah, sure. Let's go. Let's do it."
I didn't even think, "Oh, my God, this guy that beat up Rihanna."
I was not thinking about that.
I was just thinking about, "Oh, let's go to after party. Let's go have fun."
[Koul] She goes to his hotel suite,
at which point she's asked to give up her phone.
They're trying to preserve their privacy.
They're celebrities, they're public figures.
So when I got there, there was like this little bar
and I saw cocaine.
I saw some pills, weed.
Everything was there.
When I saw Chris Brown the first time at the party,
he was acting weird, extremely weird.
And then I decided to grab my phone and take a picture of him.
To be honest, I think I got, like,
stuck in the moment when I saw him acting crazy,
and once I got my phone,
he saw me with my phone.
Chris Brown punched me in the face.
I'm not saying that it was right
what I did with my phone.
I know that.
But that doesn't give you rights
to punch me in the face.
Just kick me out of the party.
[interviewer speaking]
I filed a report.
And for my surprise,
they decided that he didn't want to press charges.
So I decided to file the lawsuit
because I knew I had my rights.
And in response, he posts a video.
Obviously, somebody just looking to get a check or start some [bleep]."
I don't know this old-looking [bleep].
This old, like, dusty--
That just goes to show you that he's learned nothing.
If you came to Vegas, you probably came to my room,
you was too ugly to get in.
So the message is that
somehow you have no value or any worth to me
if you're somehow not attracted.
So it wasn't enough to physically assault her,
but then to verbally and emotionally assault her on social media.
He used the same strategies
that you would see in intimate partner relationships.
Right after Chris has his deposition,
it was the time that his lawyers decided to do the settlement.
[Carpenter] Chris does say
that time and time again,
these people are lying,
that there's this sort of
negative campaign against me.
[paparazzi clamoring]
But he's the common denominator.
It does have some people wondering,
"Well, if he's doing that in public...
what's he doing behind closed doors?"
[Carpenter] When you look at Chris Brown's rap sheet,
there are sexual assault allegations in there as well.
In 2017, Chris was 28,
and the woman says that her and a friend
were invited to an after party
at Chris Brown's recording studio.
And then, eventually, Chris Brown's home.
And in order to party with them,
they take her phone.
She gives them her phone.
They will not give it back
when she says that she wants to leave.
[Dorsey] What this young victim noticed
when she first got to Chris's house is that
he was allegedly supplying everybody with drugs,
and it seemed to her what he was trying to do
was to get everybody's inhibitions lowered.
[Koul] So at the house she's taken into another room
where there's a bunch of adults
having sex with each other.
She says that Chris asked for the door to be barricaded.
She claimed that she was sexually assaulted
multiple times at Chris Brown's home.
She didn't directly accuse Chris Brown of sexual assault,
but she did accuse him of sort of having this environment
to initiate some sort of an orgy.
Once she got her phone back and she left the premises,
she reported the situation right away to police,
and she did a rape kit.
Police never charged Chris Brown,
apparently because of a lack of evidence.
But there was a civil suit that was filed,
and then eventually it was quietly settled.
[Dorsey] Generally, cases settled out of court does not mean
that the allegations did not occur.
It does not mean that this person was just a gold digger
and out looking for money.
It just means that this entity,
this individual don't want it to get out.
After that, there were more allegations that came forward.
Two years later, another woman came forward
accusing Chris of aggravated rape.
[man speaking French]
[in English] Paris police talked to him,
but he was released without any charges.
[Sayegh] While we all love the theory
that we're all equal under the law,
justice is not equal.
And it also happens to those
who have extreme amount of wealth
and extreme amounts of celebrity.
[Carpenter] One of Chris Brown's attorneys is Mark Geragos,
and he is a renowned defense attorney.
He's worked with some of the biggest stars in the world.
Michael Jackson, Diddy, Winona Ryder, Nicole Richie.
And he's really known for keeping his celeb clients out of jail.
And then there was another lawsuit against Chris Brown
accusing him of rape.
[Dorsey] These are all very different people
in different countries now who don't know one another
who've had very similar allegations
with the same common denominator:
Chris Brown.
Everybody can't be lying.
There's something here that we at least need to pay attention to.
But the problem is,
all we know from them is the lawsuit,
and we never hear from these women.
So we never really get the full story.
We never get to hear the details straight from their mouth.
[interviewer speaking]
[Jane Doe breathes deeply]
[voice distorted] Yeah. Um...
Chris Brown raped me.
It was rape.
[interviewer speaking]
[Jane Doe] Even coming forward as a Jane Doe,
some people still found out who I was
and I was attacked on the media.
Death threats.
Like, I got a lot of different stuff
that made it very scary for me.
So even coming forward now with this,
I'm just hoping that I can shed light
to what really happened.
[clears throat]
I had just moved to LA.
I was trying to pursue a dance career,
and it was about to be the New Year,
so we went out to Miami.
It was just gonna be me and my friend.
But two days before New Year's,
I get a FaceTime call
and it's from this guy I had met back in LA.
And he's like, "Oh, hey, I see you're in Miami." And I'm like, "Yeah."
Then he's like, "Well, you should pull up.
I'm at Diddy's house right now."
And then he, like, pans the camera and he's on a yacht.
And it's like a big yacht, literally, I guess, Danny's house.
And I was like, "Oh, okay, well, I guess that's better than the beach.
So I was like, "Okay, cool."
[Koul] Since Spring 2024, Diddy has been the center
of a couple of rape and assault allegations and investigations,
and in September,
he was charged with racketeering and sex trafficking.
He pled not guilty.
I think a lot of people had heard all sorts of things
about Diddy throughout the years,
but in 2020, he wasn't being investigated.
We get on the yacht and it's the morning time,
so it's like 10:00 am,
and everybody is, like, drunk and hungover, I guess,
still, from the night before.
There wasn't a lot of people.
It was like, really, maybe like 15 people.
So I see Diddy. He welcomes us and he's really nice.
And then I see my friend, I go hug him.
And then I see Chris.
I grew up listening to all the R&B and everything,
but what I liked about Chris
was, like, he was an all-around entertainer.
I thought it was like a sign.
Like, hey, maybe I could talk to this person
who is literally the king of R&B,
and he would maybe be able to help me
or guide me or give me some advice.
Just, if that's the base level,
and then the craziest, obvious dream would be
like for him to, you know, maybe putting me on his tour.
The only thing bad about Chris
that we all know is that he was abusive towards Rihanna.
But I wasn't even thinking about that.
[Koul] I don't know how old this Jane Doe is,
but let's say this Jane Doe is 21 or 22.
To her, the last time Rihanna was in the picture with Chris Brown,
that was 10 years earlier.
So she was 11 or 12.
She doesn't necessarily understand what happened with Rihanna.
She maybe doesn't even know that he admitted to it.
She doesn't know fully that he has a predilection
for punching women in the face.
Allegedly.
[Jane Doe] Chris came over and he was just like,
"You know, are you having a good time?"
I was just like, "Yeah, I'm good."
And then I just compliment him,
like, "You're obviously a great dancer.
I'm a dancer, too."
He was like, "Oh, how long you been dancing?"
And I told him I just moved to LA
and I, you know, want to dance.
He's like, "Just keep grinding,
keep networking
and you'll get where you need to go."
And I was like, "Yeah."
[interviewer speaking]
We had talked and he had handed me a drink.
I'm not even sure.
This is where my memory starts getting a little bit weird.
So he had handed me a drink
and I don't remember if I saw him pour it,
but I just drank it.
And then he just hands me another drink
and I'm like, "Okay, this is cool."
And so as I'm staying there,
I did start to feel like, just kind of tired,
and my body was just feeling like a little heavy or whatever,
and he was just like,
"You know, it's kind of loud out here.
Do you want to go towards the back?"
And I was like, " Sure."
So I'm like, "Oh, he's gonna take me on a tour of the yacht.
This is great."
We go down to the back and it's like a bedroom.
And then he, like, kind of just sprawls out on the bed.
And so we're just talking, talking,
and I hate that I can't really...
[voice breaking] even remember what we were talking about.
I just, I remember I did lay back.
[sniffles]
And I'm like, "Why can't I get up?"
The next thing I knew, he was on top of me.
I couldn't move.
And I said no, and then I felt him...
Yeah, next thing I knew, he was, like, inside me,
and I didn't want...
He was just like, "It's okay."
And he's, like, kissing me to stop me from talking.
And then I felt him, like, [bleep] inside of me,
and I was just, like, so disgusted.
He grabbed my phone and he was like,
"Now, when you come back to LA,
like, you know, you can just hit me up."
He puts his number in and texts himself, "Hey."
[sniffling]
That is not uncommon,
especially if somebody
has taken advantage of someone.
It makes more sense to keep them close,
to send them positive messages
and making sure that they're not going
and reporting anything and that it's all good.
[Jane Doe] Most girls, I think, would be happy
that, "Oh, my God, I got to have sex with Chris Brown."
I didn't want that.
Like, this is not what I wanted.
[sniffles]
[West] This woman is describing
how non-stranger rapists operate.
A researcher did a study on men
who had committed rape on college campus.
There was a real clear pattern
about how these rapists operate.
First, they target select.
So the predator's gonna go to some kind of social setting.
They're not gonna select the person
who is powerful or successful or credible,
if they went to the police, would immediately be believed.
They're gonna select a person who's vulnerable,
who's new to town or needy in some way.
So here's a woman new to Los Angeles,
trying to make it in the business,
hoping for that big break.
The perpetrators will also manipulate you with drugs or alcohol.
The third step is increasing vulnerability.
"Oh, it's really noisy down here.
Let's go somewhere and talk."
And then take the young woman back to the room.
Here she is, impaired, with a strange man,
and then they would initiate the assault.
They didn't have to physically use a lot of violence.
And then you go away from that interaction and think,
"How did I get myself in this situation?"
My brain is just like really
trying to rationalize what just happened.
"How did this happen?"
Did I agree to this?
"This is my fault."
It's like, I'm even... I'm confused myself.
"I should have seen the signs."
I didn't want anyone to know.
I was just, like, so embarrassed.
[West] But what they don't understand is that it didn't just happen.
The perpetrator set it up.
[Jane Doe] When we did leave, he texted me.
He was just like, "Hey, it was nice meeting you,
and, oh, yeah, would you mind, like, grabbing a Plan B?"
And I was just like, "What the [bleep]?"
Like, I was like...
You know, but I was actually like,
"This is a good idea because I don't want any of this."
I didn't want any of this.
And so I did, and I took it,
and then, like the next day...
I don't know if I should talk about this
or if this was known that I texted about sex again.
There's so much work that women do after they're assaulted
to wrestle control back of the story we tell ourselves.
I was actually really hurt.
So I was still trying to, like, you know,
salvage what could happen.
And what we end up doing
is lying to ourselves a little bit.
"Look at this famous guy who gave me his phone number.
Something must have gone right.
Maybe if I see him again, maybe everything will be okay,
and then I don't have to investigate
this life event that's happened to me."
Maybe I just do need to get more clarity,
and that's why I still did continue to talk to him
when I went back to LA.
Then he, like, FaceTimed me,
and he never really brought it up.
It was like a weird position of, like, this person
who just did this bad thing to me,
but now he's still being nice to me.
And so I was like, well, maybe he is sorry
and people do make mistakes and other things,
and I still was so confused.
[West] We have a lot of stereotypes about rape,
but if you're not ready to acknowledge it to yourself,
we call those unacknowledged victims.
So out of the... he would he randomly call me, like, every few weeks.
It was kind of more getting into a sexual nature,
like, he was just like,
"Show me what you're wearing," and "Oh, you look so good,"
and whatever.
Then he would sometimes say, like, "Oh, send me a picture,"
or "Send me something sexy."
And so he would say that over the phone.
And so then I would text it to him,
and then that's what it mainly was.
Over the course of the next months,
most of our communication was like FaceTime.
And now that I'm looking back, I'm like,
"Oh, the FaceTime covered your tracks
'cause I can't prove anything you say."
But the thing that I saw he was responding mainly to
was like me being sexy and stuff.
Like, "Okay, like, let me just..."
At this point, I had convinced myself.
I was like, "Well, this is what I gotta do, and this is it."
[Jane Doe speaking on voicemail]
[Taylor] She wants the connection because that's keeping her
from kind of moving into that space of "I was raped."
Because if he then stops, that makes things very real.
And that's when I did start going to therapy,
and I finally was able to, like, open up about what really happened.
And it's like a long time.
[interviewer speaking]
[sighs] Yeah. Um...
Chris Brown raped me.
And I can say that,
and I know it for a fact
instead of telling myself that I wasn't...
and it was. It was rape.
My name is Ariel Mitchell, Esq.
There was a case I was already working on,
and one of the clients in that case,
she had posted on Twitter
that she had been sexually assaulted.
[Jane Doe] I had been seeing in the media
something similar had happened to this girl.
And so there was this website
where you could leave a comment, and so I did.
Probably saw an opportunity
to support a girl with my story.
And the legal team reached out to me.
She tells me that she was at Diddy's house and was sexually assaulted.
But it was Chris Brown.
I thought, "How do I help this young lady?
How do I even verify her story?"
So certain things I didn't have anymore
because I had got a new phone,
and so I didn't have all of the exact texts.
I just had certain screenshots.
[Mitchell] But in this situation, we had, at least enough,
for me to verify you were there.
He was there.
It occurred on this day.
And then she also provided us some messages
from after that time to support.
They were like,
"Hey, you might have a case as well,"
and I was like, "Oh.
That wasn't the intention."
And he was like, "Well, maybe you should try.
We can keep you anonymous.
It would help other people to come forward too."
We filed and made it go public.
The media response was overwhelming.
Chris Brown is going to turn around and decide to rape a gal.
I think it's highly... it's highly unlikely.
Chris Brown is in trouble again.
Let's talk about the $20 million lawsuit
filed against Chris Brown for alleged rape.
Now he's being sued by a woman.
$20 million lawsuit.
[people echoing] $20 million.
We hear what we consider astronomical numbers,
but it's about penalty.
It's about punitive.
If I go assault somebody and it's only gonna cost me ten grand,
what is that when I'm a multi-millionaire, right?
Punish them so they don't do it again.
[Koul] If you don't go through the civil courts, then what are you left with?
But if you just dash off a blog post
or you do an interview or whatever else,
what do you get there?
More people saying that you're making it up for attention.
So she's either making it up for attention or for money,
or she's got to shut the [bleep] up.
Those are the three options.
There's a secret fourth,
which is that the justice system takes over
and does what it's supposed to do.
[Mitchell] So we actually had a conversation
with the police department.
I feel like the police were there because of the media attention.
The Miami Police detective
said that she had received information from Chris Brown's team
and that their version of events
was that my client was a crazed fan.
[Carpenter] Here's the thing, though.
Police found out that this woman had sent a text to Chris
the next day after it had happened,
and she says, "I just want to be with you again sexually."
[Mitchell] Once these messages had come out,
we were just like, "Well, why didn't you give us this initially?"
She told me something about
her phone auto deleted all the messages after a year,
and she switched service,
so she didn't have those old messages anymore.
[Carpenter] Also, Chris Brown had some text messages
that she had just sent to him over months.
Not only that, he also had a voicemail
that she had left for him.
[Jane Doe in voicemail] Just let me know.
You want me to leave you alone, I definitely will.
She had sent him a nude photo.
Then Chris ghosted her and he didn't text her back.
And then she sent an emoji
with sort of tears in the eyes.
[Mitchell] These messages are messages
that Chris Brown and his team provided to the police.
There's only one side of the conversation here,
and she's just texting a ghost from the end of January...
to August.
[Jane Doe] And the way he provided the messages,
it made it look like I was talking to myself.
Like I was just sending him pictures and voice notes and stuff
and asking to come over and all this.
But it was not that.
My client was able to provide alternative messages
that actually included the deleted messages from Chris.
He was not just ignoring her. He was keeping it going.
But it was hard to verify
which series of text messages were accurate.
That became a separate issue because now it's like,
"Okay, well, is my client fabricating evidence to the police?"
I believe that Chris deleted all of his responses to those messages.
[Mitchell] So my policy is very simple.
I need to know everything.
I think maybe she didn't come forward with these
'cause she wouldn't have to go through
an additional line of questioning of,
"Well, why were you just being chill with him?"
Which is understandable.
In all honesty, I was concerned about if it was a situation of
"Do these messages just not exist,
or do they just not exist to me right now?"
Which are two different things.
So we had went so far as trying to get subpoenas
for the telephone companies
to recover, possibly, the messages.
Which, apparently, is very difficult and very expensive.
Now we're only left with the messages from Chris
when we have no evidence to contradict.
It was almost like a lot of egg on my face
because I had a lot of people personally contact me and say,
"That's what you get for going up against Chris Brown."
Under no circumstance do I believe Chris is innocent
or that this didn't happen.
And I informed my client.
I said, "Don't take this representation and us not continuing
as a means to not pursue this with another attorney."
And I just think she just was so saddened by the process
that she didn't even want to tell
another set of attorneys what had happened.
It was heartbreaking.
Honestly, I was so heartbroken,
I cried the whole day.
I knew I was going like David and Goliath,
but in real life,
a rock is not gonna do anything to a big giant.
[Mitchell] I absolutely feel that the industry is protecting Chris Brown
and individuals like him.
They say with great power comes great responsibility, but not here.
With great power comes great abuse.
[people clamoring]
[Koul] What happened with Rihanna
happened with a famous person,
and there were visuals for us to look at.
But everybody after her wasn't really famous.
Several of these women don't even have names.
With everybody else, he can just say,
"Oh, it's bullshit. She lied.
And they will give me the benefit of the doubt
before they give it to some woman
they've never heard of before."
I just think he's a violent person,
personally.
You're supposed to mature as you get older.
He's got 15, at least,
cases of reported, whether criminally or civil actions against him,
causing acts of violence.
And just recently, out of Texas,
a $50 million lawsuit.
This isn't a domestic violence case,
but reported violence.
But look how long it took for R. Kelly to fall.
It wasn't good enough that we had video of him peeing on a young girl.
That wasn't gonna do it.
It took things like a docuseries.
It took the power of the media.
The same thing that builds them
has to be the same thing that destroys them.
[inhales deeply] And I just...
I wish it didn't happen. Like, I wish...
I can go back and never go in that yacht
and just be a normal girl
and I didn't have to go through all this, but I did.
[sniffles]
[West] Domestic violence thrives on silence, secrecy and shame.
So it's all around us all of the time,
but we don't talk about it.
Unless people start speaking up
and that people actually stop
victim blaming the people who do speak up,
then that's the only way that he can be stopped.
[Dorsey] Chris Brown is an amazing and talented musician,
but let's call a thing a thing.
I think he's an abuser of women.
Consistently, unapologetically.
[Taylor] And we have to talk about holding ourselves accountable.
Okay, why continue to support people
that we know are harmful people?
What does that say about us?
We can make the argument
that the situation with Rihanna happened 15 years ago.
Maybe she's forgiven him, she's moved on.
Maybe a lot of people have.
But don't forget that there have been several instances since then.
Don't forget Paris. Don't forget Vegas.
Don't forget the yacht.
Don't forget the after party.
[man] Back up! Back up! Back up!
[Taylor] Don't forget Karrueche Tran.
Don't forget Good Morning America.
Don't forget him throwing a brick
through his mother's car windshield.
Don't forget all these stories
that have come from people that have felt like they weren't heard.
[woman crying]
Don't forget that they exist.
[sniffles]
As long as anybody is a victim of intimate partner violence,
we have to talk about it.
That no one gets a pass.
Domestic violence goes beyond the story of one celebrity.
Intimate partner violence alone affects
more than 10 million people each year
across every race, class and gender.
My name is Sunny Hostin.
For years, I was a federal prosecutor
and a voice for victims,
especially the ones impacted
by domestic violence.
It's an epidemic that hides in plain sight.
And so to expose the ugly truth
around this issue,
I'm sitting with the organization
that has answered more than 7 million calls
for support and safety,
and a woman,
whose crowning moment was not only winning a beauty pageant,
but bravely calling out her abuser in public.
Because my abuser is here today.
And later, ID's No Excuse For Abuse partner,
who has the only global directory
of helplines and services.
A look at how a blockbuster movie sparked
dialogue and awareness.
More on that later.
But first, we have pop culture writer,
Scaachi Koul.
Thanks for joining me.
Thanks for having me.
You know, what struck me
was that the assault on Rihanna was
over 15 years ago.
But I remember it like it was yesterday...
-Mm-hmm. -...because I remember being in the courtroom.
But I just recently had a friend
take her son and a group of other children
to a Chris Brown concert.
And when they came back,
I was sort of shocked.
And I said to her and to the teenagers,
"Do you know that he really, really hurt Rihanna?"
-Mm-hmm. -They had no idea.
And then I showed them the pictures.
The reactions were different.
One 14-year-old was horrified.
One immediately deleted every Chris Brown song
from her playlist.
One said, "Well, what if it's AI?"
-Yeah, yeah. -[laughing] Okay.
So when you're talking about this generation,
how do we get them to pay attention
to something like this?
Well, they're not going to pay attention to it
-if we're not paying attention to it. -Mmm.
We have a long tradition of still engaging
in work made by men accused of harming women.
And they make money off of that.
-They make a lot of money off of it, yeah. -Yeah.
And that money helps obfuscate the reality
of what they may have done.
Do you think a part of this could be
the notion is, you know,
he was held criminally accountable,
he did his own documentary,
admitted what he did,
and he deserves to move on?
I mean, maybe.
-He can do whatever he wants. -Mm-hmm.
And everybody gets to make their own decision
about what they do with it.
If one person takes accountability
for something one time, that's wonderful,
but it doesn't necessarily mean
that we have to not talk about it anymore.
-Yeah. -It's still in the culture.
It's still something we're trying to make sense of.
And there are still a lot of people who are defiant
about the facts around Chris Brown and Rihanna
that still think, "What did she do wrong?"
Or, you know, "How do we know that really happened?"
Even though he has admitted to a lot of these details,
we're not done.
The work is not done.
I would tell people,
-"Google the photos". -Yeah. Yeah.
Because we don't show them in the documentary,
-but they are brutal. -Yeah.
But I would hope eventually we can get to a place
where we don't have to share
the ugliest sides of ourselves as victims
in order for people to recognize what happened.
Well, one thing, though.
The Rihanna incident was 15 years ago.
But in the documentary,
-there is another alleged survivor. -Mm-hmm.
And that was just a few years ago.
Why do we then still have this amnesia?
[sighs] I think we are primed to believe people
whose names we know and whose faces we recognize.
And I think he provides a service to people,
which is that he makes music that they like,
and the music is tied to their memories
and tied to their feelings.
And this woman is just some girl.
She is no Rihanna.
Yes. I think there's a clear reason
why that case was so big.
-It's because he did it to someone we knew. -Mm-hmm.
And so it becomes harder to say,
-"Well, that couldn't have possibly happened." -Mmm.
Because you like her, and you know her,
and you have a parasocial relationship
with her, too.
Similar to how you might have one with Chris.
It's the same thing with, like, Diddy and Cassie.
[ominous music playing]
[Sunny] We've seen the video
of Sean Diddy Combs beating Cassie Ventura.
What was so galling about it is that he is following her.
But you can see that she exited the situation.
-She was trying to leave. -Yes.
[Scaachi] And he feels bold enough
to run out in the hallway of a hotel in a towel,
and he drags her back into it, literally.
-And didn't fight back at all. -No.
-Couldn't. -Couldn't.
Don't you think
that that video changed his accountability?
Well, it had to.
-What else was he going to say? -Right.
I don't know what to do with a culture
that feels like it needs
to watch women be brutalized like that
-in order to believe her. -Mm-hmm.
-She told us a thousand times. -Yes.
There was obviously a lot of energy
put into trying to keep that video from coming out.
Well, yes, he didn't think,
-I think, it would ever come out. -Yeah.
-He seemed pretty confident because-- -And...
-She files a lawsuit, and then, of course... -Yeah.
...the next thing that happened was
he settled the next day.
But do you think
they are less likely to lie
because they're celebrities
and these other women that come forward,
it's just a money grab?
I do think
that a lot of people will look at a famous person
and a non-famous person
and think the non-famous person
will get something out of this.
There's [chuckles] riches on the other side
of accusing a rich, wealthy person
of having harmed them.
But for a celebrity, there's only downside.
It's downside across the board is the reality of it.
And any woman who's ever come forward
about a boss who's harassed them
or a boyfriend who won't leave them alone
or any man who's ever bothered them,
they know the downside is enormous.
And rape is really the most underreported crime
-in our country. -Yeah.
I think only second to domestic violence.
Yeah, and those are two crimes where the first question,
unlike with a home invasion or a robbery,
-people ask, "Well, what did you do?" -Yeah.
"How did you make this happen?"
There's almost no upside in saying anything.
Thanks for joining me.
Thanks for having me.
Up next, we hear from 2024's Miss Kansas
and the viral moment
that sparked controversy nationwide.
But that's not going to stop me
-from being on this Miss Kansas stage... -[audience cheering]
...and from representing
as the next Miss Kansas.
With us, we have Katie Jones,
CEO of the National Domestic Violence Hotline,
Alexis Smith, Miss Kansas,
an advocate for healthy relationships,
and Psychologist Dr. Carolyn West,
a resident fellow
at the University of Washington.
Thank you so much for joining me.
And Katie, let me go to you first.
It seems to me
that this country frames domestic violence
as a black and brown problem.
I don't think that's true.
Domestic violence does not discriminate
based on race,
socioeconomic status, educational background.
It impacts anyone and everyone.
One in four women,
one in seven men will experience
severe physical violence in their lifetime.
However, we know some communities are
disproportionately impacted,
and that's important to recognize.
And we know that certain communities may
have more challenges accessing services.
One in three Latino women report domestic violence.
American Indian, Alaska Native women report
four in five.
So there are certain circumstances
where that may be exasperated.
It's a everybody problem
-that we all have to be concerned about. -[Sunny] Mm-hmm.
[Carolyn] So the challenge is,
you know, being a professor for 30 years,
I really devoted my life
to figuring out,
well, how do we talk
about the similarities
across these different groups
without erasing the experiences
of these marginalized populations,
but then how do we talk about the differences
without reinforcing the same stereotypes.
[Sunny] But what scares me
when I think about this,
are the women, let's say, in the middle of the country
that are living alone
with their spouse
-who owns a gun... -[Katie] Mmm.
...who is best friends with the only sheriff in town,
and who is completely reliant upon a spouse
and is raising young children.
That scares me.
You bring up an important point.
People in small communities, who are they going to call?
Certain places get more attention
to domestic violence than others,
which is why it's important to talk about it.
We know that it is so pervasive
and it's often the secret.
And yet, so many people,
when we hear about tragedy happening,
say, "Something told me
something was wrong in our relationship
and I didn't know what to do."
There are people, I think, that are probably
in abusive relationships
and don't recognize the signs of these relationships.
Can you give us some sort of roadmap?
Things like jealousy
and possessiveness.
If there's verbal and emotional abuse.
[Katie] 98% of relationships where there's abuse,
-there's financial control happening. -[Carolyn] Mmm.
It is a great way to keep someone in a relationship
is if they can't break free
'cause they don't have the money to do so.
If you feel like your world is getting smaller,
you're cutting off contact
with important people in your life
because of this individual,
that really may be a indication as well.
Now, Miss Kansas,
you shared with the world
that you had been abused.
What gave you the courage to tell the world
that that had been happening to you?
Yeah, so as Miss Kansas,
I represent with my community service initiative
Respect Reclaimed
advocating for healthy relationships.
It stems from my own personal experience
of falling into my family cycle of abuse
at the age of 14.
This same partner that I had experienced as a teenage girl
was the exact same former partner
that showed up at the Miss Kansas competition.
And so when I was asked,
what would be my vision as Miss Kansas...
What will be your vision
as the next brand ambassador
for the Miss Kansas Organization?
My vision as the next Miss Kansas is
to eliminate unhealthy and abusive relationships.
Matter of fact, some of you out in this audience saw me
very emotional
because my abuser is here today.
But that's not gonna stop me
-from being on this Miss Kansas stage... -[audience cheering]
...and from representing
as the next Miss Kansas.
Ultimately, in that moment, it wasn't courage.
It was anger.
-[Sunny] Mmm. -[Alexis] It was fear.
It was frustration of facing my abuser during intermission.
That is the only thing that was on my mind.
In a way, he took this opportunity away from me.
He took the opportunity away from me to really explain
why I wanted to be Miss Kansas in the first place.
But I'm glad that I don't know where it came from. [chuckles]
I'm glad that it did come out.
That way, one, I called him an abuser
-for the first time... -[Sunny] Mmm.
...to his face,
but also showed everyone
that the crown and the sash, it's great.
It provides me this amazing platform.
But I'm so much more under it.
-I have a story under it. -[Sunny] Yeah.
And we're all seeing it right here.
My understanding is
that you did try to go through the criminal justice system.
-Right? -I did.
So unfortunately, at the Miss Kansas competition,
I did not have a protection order
-put in place. -[Sunny] Mm-hmm.
Previously for a couple of years,
I did try and get that order,
but unfortunately, I didn't have an address
for them to be able to serve that documentation to him.
And so moving forward,
I just kind of start building that case,
keeping that paper trail that way
whenever I did have that address, I was ready,
and that's exactly what I did
after the Miss Kansas competition.
I went through 12 weeks...
-[Sunny] Mm-hmm. -[Alexis] ...of getting this protection order,
but just last week, I finally was able to serve him.
He actually agreed to the protection order,
but even within accepting the protection order,
he asked multiple times,
"So it's just one year, right?"
-Wow. -[Alexis] "It's just one year."
So yes, I do have this protection order
put in place,
but it feels like a countdown...
Mmm. Yeah.
...of when he's gonna be ready to step back in.
Our system, in my view, has not caught up
with domestic violence.
Do you think these restraining orders
and protective orders are helpful?
-[Katie] It's a tool in your toolbox. -[Carolyn] Mmm.
That could be the tool that sets your partner off,
and they become more violent when you get that.
It could be the tool
that gets your partner to stay away from you.
You know your abusive partner the best.
And that's where you want to speak
with an advocate about,
is a restraining order right for you.
Because you are the expert of your own life.
And I will say, initially,
I was terrified to get a protection order
because I knew that my abuser
-is very unpredictable. -[ladies assent]
And so as you mentioned, the setting him off,
I mean, he was already having threats of suicide.
And from my perspective,
if you're willing to do this to yourself,
why wouldn't you do it to me as well?
So even today, with this protection order,
I still have fears of murder-suicide.
Well, Katie, let me ask you about this.
There are people that have to leave their homes
in the middle of the night
with their children,
just the clothes on their backs,
while their abuser may be drunk or asleep.
What do you tell those women or those men
at that moment?
I think people think it's so easy
to get up and leave
and it is incredibly difficult.
One, I hope there's a shelter bed available
because the domestic violence service system has been
overburdened and under-resourced
-since the beginning of time. -[Sunny] Mmm.
So oftentimes someone could be
calling the National Domestic Violence Hotline
and we're trying to find a shelter where there's space.
There might be a waitlist for counseling services.
And then we're saying,
"If there is a bed, can you get a bag?
Can you grab your ID?
You might have to change your kids' schools.
You might have to change jobs."
It is not an easy removal.
And we're saying "It's going to get harder
before it gets better."
And we're also saying
"Your chances of lethality increase
when you're going to leave that relationship,
because that is when your abusive partner is
losing power and control over you,
and violence can become more dangerous.
This is the most dangerous time for you in the relationship."
-Leaving is the most dangerous time. -Leaving the relationship.
And I think that's why we have to talk about safety planning.
You want to say more about that, Katie,
in terms of how to get that safety plan
with your organization
or how you did that effectively?
[Katie] So safety planning is a critical piece
of your relationship when there's abuse,
whether that's your planning to leave
or you're still staying in that relationship.
And it is not a one-size-fits-all.
And speaking with an advocate,
whether you're calling the National Domestic Violence Hotline
or your local program, is the first step.
You want to talk to a skilled advocate
-on how to do that. -[Sunny] Mmm.
But planning an exit strategy in your home,
should violence break out, would be step number one.
Where you might think the safest place is in your home,
there's often things in that place
that can be used as weapons,
and it can be very dangerous.
-So we want to craft that with you. -True.
-Kitchen. -[Carolyn] Kitchen.
There's boiling water, knives, pots, pans
that can be used as weapons.
In your bathroom, the toilet can be used
to drown you.
Like, there's many things
that you want to craft a very special plan
to think through.
Where's the safest place?
What's your exit out of the house?
What's a code word you can use with your kids...
-[Carolyn] Mm-hmm. -...to tell them,
-"Run to the neighbor's house to get help"? -That's good.
[Katie] Is there a way that you can leave a light on
-in your porch or off... -[Carolyn] Mm-hmm.
that tells your neighbors, "I need help"?
Who can you talk to in your safety network
that is a way that they know
that you need help when you need it?
Domestic violence thrives on silence,
secrecy, and shame.
-Ah. -So the perpetrator is
counting on you being isolated.
[Katie] And that's where we want to talk
to family and friends.
Don't give up
on your family member.
That is an abusive partner's dream.
When you give up, they have them.
Try to stay in that nonjudgmental place.
Be a support person.
Because when they're ready,
they're going to need you to lean on.
Thank you so much for sharing your expertise and your story.
[guests] Thank you.
Coming up, how is Hollywood taking action?
And if you are experiencing domestic violence
and not sure where to turn,
you'll be surprised that you could already
be talking to someone about it once a month.
With me is Jane Randel, co-founder of No More,
ID's No Excuse for Abuse partner.
No More increases awareness worldwide
and fuels culture change in a multitude of ways.
Most recently,
they consulted on the Blake Lively film,
It Ends with Us.
So, Jane, I love the work that No More does.
And I loved the movie,
It Ends with Us.
-And so did millions and millions of other people. -[Sunny chuckling] Yes.
[Jane] The movie, It Ends With Us, is
about people who don't realize
that they're in an abusive relationship.
What was it about No More's work
that led to working
with director Justin Baldoni
on such an important film?
[Jane] I met Justin years ago,
and he got to understand what No More was about,
and when they were working on the script,
he was very committed to getting it right.
He said, "Let's work together on this."
No More has worked on the movie
-for about two years... -Mmm.
[Jane] ...from the time of the script,
through a read-through, providing advice,
helping Justin,
helping to arrange for him to go sit in
-on a batterer's intervention program... -Mmm.
...so that it was portrayed in a way
-that was realistic... -Yes.
...and accessible
and would grab people.
Part of the other way that No More helped
with the movie, It Ends with Us,
is by creating resources.
A Viewer's Guide, a Survivors Guide
community guides,
and those resources have been downloaded thousands of times
since the launch of the movie.
One fascinating thing I thought about the film is,
as you're consuming it, you're just watching it,
and then all of a sudden,
-you see it from her point of view. -Right.
[woman whimpering] Please don't do this!
Please! Please! Please!
[woman panting]
[Sunny] I thought that was masterful.
I took my husband to see it.
You know, he felt sort of like, "Wait, I've been
-tricked in a weird way." -Yeah.
And I was like, "Well, that was sort of the point."
Because you'd be surprised
how many people don't realize
-that they're in an abusive relationship. -Yeah.
There are people
who have shared their stories of walking away from the movie
and literally leaving their abuser that night.
Really?
And people are sharing these stories.
And that, I know, was one of Justin Baldoni's goals,
was to reach that person in the theater who needs help.
[Sunny] There's an importance in educating the public.
And speaking of that,
there's an organization called Shear Haven
that taps a small group that reaches the masses.
We have some video.
My name is Susanne Shepherd Post,
and I'm a salon owner in Nashville, Tennessee.
We spend hours with our clients.
Often we'll see them more frequently
than they see some of their best friends.
And there's times that we can sense
when something isn't quite right.
We might see bruising,
patches of hair that have been pulled.
I've heard people disclose
something about their relationship
that honestly is a red flag.
And that's why I knew
that beauty professionals could be such a unique helper.
I'm the co-founder
of the Shear Haven YWCA initiative.
We educate beauty professionals
about the signs of domestic violence
and how to respond safely and appropriately,
and how not to respond.
Our instinct,
caring for the person that they're with,
is you should just leave.
And that could be potentially really dangerous advice.
We know that directing someone to resources
could be the key
to a life-and-death situation.
The education is a free 20-minute online training.
To date, we've reached over 135,000 people
in over 125 countries with this education.
That's remarkable. [chuckles]
[Jane] No, it's amazing.
You do spend a lot of time with your hairstylists.
They are like therapists, almost like hair-apists.
I spend a lot of time with mine.
Sometimes.
[Jane] And that's a place where your abuser
probably won't be there with you, right?
And I've heard all sorts of different ways
that people are getting information in lipstick tubes.
No More itself is part
-of an app called Bright Sky... -Mm-hmm.
which masks as a weather app,
but it's really all sorts of information
around domestic violence.
Abusers are limited
-only by their own imagination... -Mmm.
...so we have to help women
and be imaginative in how we find ways to help them.
Be a little creative.
-100%. -Yeah.
Jane, thank you so much for joining me,
and thank you so much
for the important work that you're doing.
-Thank you for having me. -Yeah.
ID and No More encourage
viewers to visit noexcuseforabuse.com
and read the harrowing and triumphant stories
of survival and perseverance.
I'm Sunny Hostin.
Thanks for joining me.