A week after the New York Daily News published an article in which one man claimed that hip-hop icon Afrika Bambaataa sexually abused him as a teenager, three other men have since come forward with strikingly similar allegations.
According to NY Daily, “several men” have accused Bambaataa of sexually abusing them when they were teenagers since the paper broke the story last week.
The first purported victim to step forward was Ronald Savage, a Democratic Party activist and former music executive. Savage claims that Bambaataa abused Savage at least five times in 1980, which resulted in “deep emotional wounds.”
After Savage’s account was made public, others were inspired to do the same.
“I know what Ronald Savage is saying is true because he did it to me,” one alleged victim, who chooses to remain anonymous, told the paper. “I have never spoken to anybody about this and when I did, I said ‘Holy s—-, they finally caught up to him.’”
“I still have a lot of anger about this,” said another accusant named Troy, who did not give his last name to the news source. “I’ve been dealing with this for years. It’s a shame this didn’t come out earlier.”
Bruce Campbell, 39-year-old Bronx native, gave an explicit account of the abuse, as well as a description of his subsequent relationship with Bambaataa, which rings similar to those of the other victims:
“Campbell and Bambaataa’s other accusers all say the music star showed them pornographic pictures or videos and then performed oral sex on them.
‘He showed me a book with a picture of a penis and said, ‘You don’t have to be gay for me to suck your d—-,’ Troy said.
Campbell says he remained close to Bambaataa years after the abuse stopped. Bambaataa sent him books and put money in his commissary account when he was incarcerated for three years on an assault charge.
‘He was a big part of my life,’ says Campbell, known on the street as ‘Poppy.’”
While members of Bambaataa’s legal team have remained silent since the allegations were first reported, hip-hop organization Zulu Nation, which Bambaataa founded roughly four decades ago, has openly denied accusations against the performer.
Campbell also told NY Daily that both Zulu Nation and Bambaataa reached out to him after Campbell posted a video to YouTube months ago, in which he claimed that Bambaataa had molested him as a teenager during the late 80s. (The video has since been deleted.)
According to Campbell, Bambaataa acknowledged the abuse, apologized, and promised he would release an official statement regarding the matter.
“He never did any of those things,” Campbell stated to NY Daily. “He’s a manipulator and a liar. He’s just waiting for this chaos to blow over so he can go back to his dark, dingy hole and go back to his old ways. He needs to put down the candy and let the little boys go.”
“He is a pervert,” Campbell said. “He likes little boys.”
In turn, Zulu Nation called Campbell “both a liar and a government paid police informant.” The organization also said that NY Daily News is “controlled by U.S. government intelligence” in response to their initial report.
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