Author Ian Halperin details new revelations in book “Whitney & Bobbi Kristina: The Deadly Price of Fame” released Tuesday.
Shocking details of Whitney Houston and daughter Bobbi Kristina Brown’s lives were revealed in a new unauthorized biography released early Tuesday morning.
“Whitney & Bobbi Kristina: The Deadly Price of Fame” by Ian Halperin details how eerily similar the Grammy winning singer’s daughter is to her mother and how both their lives were marred by drug abuse and tragedy.
Disturbing claims include how Bobbi Kristina was battling drugs and was suicidal by age 14 and even tried to stab her “Bodyguard” star mother before slashing her own wrists. Houston died in 2012 at age 48, while Brown, 22, was found face-down and unresponsive in the bathtub of her Georgia home in January. Her grandmother, Cissy Houston, has said that Brown has “global irreversible brain damage.”
On Jan. 31 when she was found, Brown was rushed to North Fulton Hospital in Roswell, Georgia. She was later moved to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta and transferred to a medical rehabilitation facility at the end of March.
Published by Gallery Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, “Whitney & Bobbi Kristina: The Deadly Price of Fame” is now available on Amazon.
Author and investigative journalist Halperin is the New York Times best-selling author of “Unmasked: The Final Years of Michael Jackson” and “Love & Death: The Murder of Kurt Cobain,” among other biographies.
He has also directed and produced several films, including the highly acclaimed documentaries “Gone Too Soon,” “Chasing Gaga,” and “The Cobain Case.”
Read 7 of the book’s most shocking revelations here:
' 1. Hospital drama: The Houston vs. Brown Family Battle
Tensions between Bobby Brown and Whitney’s family continued even after Bobbi Kristina fell into a coma. When grandmother Cissy Houston arrived in Atlanta from her New Jersey home six days after Bobbi Kristina was hospitalized, the Houston and Brown families had to work out a visitation schedule to ensure that Cissy and Bobby Brown “never had to cross paths.” Halperin also wrote that Hollywood multi-hyphenate Tyler Perry loaned Bobby Brown the private plane that flew him from Los Angeles to Atlanta to be by his daughter’s bedside. The mogul also supplied a plane to fly Whitney’s body from L.A. to New Jersey after her death in 2012.
' 2. Nick Gordon and the hard-partying crowd, bad influences on Bobbi Kristina
Before her near drowning, Bobbi Kristina was hanging with a rough crowd and susceptible to bad influences, claims Halperin, which included boyfriend Gordon. “The past couple of years she hung with a bunch of crazies, they were wild and reckless,” a friend told the author. Another friend who was staying in her Atlanta home when she was found claimed, “Kristi does all the drugs that Whitney did and more, including heroin. She uses anything that is put in front of her.”
' 3. Bobbi Kristina was hooked on drugs and suicidal by 14
According to Ann Davis, a relation of Bobby Brown‘s mother, Bobbi Kristina was sent for psychiatric evaluation two weeks before her 15th birthday. The troubled teen allegedly tried to stab her mother before slashing her own wrists in a suicide attempt. 4. Whitney Houston was blackmailed over lesbian relationship reports Halperin claims that prior to her marriage to R&B singer Bobby Brown, Houston had a lesbian relationship with close friend Robyn Crawford and a blackmailer threatened to go public with intimate details on the eve of the 1992 premiere of “The Bodyguard.” It is unknown whether the full $250,000 demand was paid, however on the eve of Houston’s wedding to Brown the diva bought Crawford a black Porsche “as a token of their friendship.” The singer’s father, John Houston, was worried that Crawford would go public and told bodyguard Kevin Ammons: “We’ve got to do something about that motherfucking bitch. She’s ruining my family and driving everybody nuts. She’s lost her grip on reality. I’ll pay you $6,000 if you put the fear of God in her.”
5. Whitney was in bad shape in her final years
A bodyguard who worked security for three of Whitney’s London concerts in 2010, two years before her death, told Halperin that the star was in very bad shape at the time. “Whitney was drugged up. She didn’t seem to know where she was,” he said. “Michael Jackson had died a year earlier and I got to see him rehearsing during his final months in London at the same venue. To me, he truly seemed to be in better shape than Whitney.”
6. Bobbi Kristina’s bathtub: Cold water plunge and facial bruises
After Bobbi Kristina was found by friend Max Lomas and aided by Gordon, Danyela Bradley noticed that “the bathwater was ice-cold and that the girl had strange marks around her mouth and chin,” wrote Halperin. Just under 20 minutes later, Brown was rushed to North Fulton Hospital in Roswell, Georgia. The author theorizes that Bobbi Kristina could have been subjected to what is known by drug-takers as “the plunge,” which involves immersing an overdose victim into cold water while administering slaps to revive them. “Despite the countless warnings against this dangerous practice,” he wrote, “I find a staggering amount of people on drug abuse forums advising people to use the cold-water method and slap the victim’s face.”
' 7. Future of Whitney’s estate if Bobbi Kristina dies
Halperin asserts that if Bobbi Kristina fails to come out of her coma the singer’s estate will go to her next of kin under Georgia law and not to Nick Gordon, who has claimed they were secretly married. “Unless Nick [Gordon] can provide evidence that the couple were legally wed,” he wrote, “her father, Bobby Brown, will inherit everything.” According to Halperin, 90 percent of the trust set up for her after Whitney’s death has not been disbursed.