Whitney Houston documentary claims singer was victim of child sex abuse

The allegations were made by Houston's half-brother and former assistant

A brand new Whitney Houston documentary has alleged the singer was sexually abused as a child.

Directed by Scottish filmmaker Kevin Macdonald, Whitney – which debuted at the Cannes Film Festival – claims that the singing icon was abused by her cousin Dee Dee Warwick.

The allegations in the documentary are made by Houston’s half-brother, former NBA basketball player Gary Garland-Houston, as well as her assistant Mary Jones.

According to The Guardian, Garland-Houston alleges – alongside the singer’s former manager Pat Houston – that he was abused by Warwick between the ages of seven and nine, when Whitney would have been just three or four years old. Jones reportedly claims that Houston used to speak of being “molested at a young age” by a woman.

Warwick, who enjoyed success as a gospel performer in the early 1970s, was the niece of Houston’s mother. Her older sister was soul-singing legend Dionne Warwick.

Whitney, described as “the definitive story” of the legendary singer, is said to feature interviews with a variety of Houston’s relatives and friends.

Macdonald, speaking about the claims, told Deadline: “I first began to suspect that there might be some kind of abuse involved before anyone had actually told me. I just had a sense, having sat watching interviews about her, watching footage of her. I had a feeling that there was something wrong with her.

“That was just an intuition, and then somebody mentioned it off-camera to me. They wouldn’t talk about it on camera, but they said Whitney had said to her that something had happened.”

Houston – one of the most successful recording artists of all time – passed away in 2012 at the age of 48 after drowning in a bathtub. Three years later, her daughter, Bobbi Kristina Brown, was found unresponsive in a bathtub and died aged 22 after spending six months in a coma

‘Whitney’ will be released in UK cinemas on 6 July

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