Mariah Carey’s mother and sister Alison both , the singer confirmed in a statement. “My heart is broken that I’ve lost my mother this past weekend. Sadly, in a tragic turn of events, my sister lost her life on the same day,” she said in a statement.
“I feel blessed that I was able to spend the last week with my mom before she passed.” Carey concluded by saying she appreciated “ everyone’s love and support and respect for my privacy during this impossible time.” No additional details regarding Patricia and Alison Carey’s deaths have been released.
Over the years, Mariah Carey has opened up about her complicated relationship with her sister, Alison Carey, and surviving brother, Morgan Carey. In her 2020 memoir, "The Meaning of Mariah Carey," the singer described the complexities of her relationship to her sister and their childhood in Long Island, New York. Mariah Carey described Alison Carey as “deeply wounded” and “the most brilliant and broken person I have ever known.
” Noting that her sister experienced the “discomfort” and “animosity” in her family firsthand, the singer wrote that Alison Carey saw “things a child should never see and I will never know.” “I do know that what she experienced damaged and derailed her girlhood,” Mariah Carey wrote. “She was fully aware when the family unit unraveled and our parents turned on each other; she absorbed the full pain of a family coming undone.
” Aside from detailing their estranged sibling relationship, Mariah Carey also noted that her sister was “extremely intelligent and curious and she loved to learn.” “I was told she brought home good grades, got into good schools, and loved music too,” Mariah Carey added. The memoir also notes that Alison Carey had two sons, Mike and Shawn.
In several chapters and stories, Mariah Carey mentions her nephews and wrote she "treasures them endlessly" in the acknowledgements. She also detailed more harrowing moments with her sister, whom she alleged had a drug problem. “My sister drugged me with Valium, offered me a pinky nail full of cocaine, inflicted me with third-degree burns, and tried to sell me out to a pimp,” Mariah Carey alleged in the book.
Her sister has denied the allegations and following the release of the memoir, Alison Carey threatened to sue sister Mariah Carey in February 2021 for $1.25 million in New York County Supreme Court. Alison Carey claimed “the infliction of immense emotional distress caused by defendant’s heartless, vicious, vindictive, despicable and totally unnecessary public humiliation of defendant’s already profoundly damaged older sister,” per .
NBC News found a summons listed in New York that includes the details in the Variety story but additional information on the status of that suit could not be found. Following the release of Mariah Carey’s memoir, her surviving brother Morgan Carey also filed a defamation lawsuit against the singer. Her memoir alleged there were violent fights between Morgan Carey and their parents, including on incident where he pushed their mother Patricia so hard into a wall that she was knocked out.
“Suddenly there was a loud, sharp noise, like an actual gunshot. My brother had pushed my mother with such force that her body slammed into the wall, making a loud cracking sound,” she wrote. Next thing I knew she was totally limp, as if her bones had melted, folding onto the floor.
It was a split second. It was an eternity. My eyes were still fixed in place, only now I was looking at my mother collapsed in a crumpled pile on the floor.
” In his defamation lawsuit against his famous sister, Morgan Carey denied that there were ever violent fights in his childhood home. His legal team specifically called the above story a “false and defamatory lie.” Elsewhere in the memoir, Mariah Carey had written that her brother provided “powdered party favors” to “the beautiful people” of New York City while working at bars and clubs in the late 1980’s.
“He was strikingly handsome and occasionally worked as a model. He was well known and well liked,” she wrote of her brother. “He discreetly supplied the beautiful people with their powdered party favors.
He was diabolically charismatic.” In Morgan Carey’s defamation lawsuit, he denies that he dealt drugs. His lawsuit against his sister also provided some details about him from his own perspective.
His legal team wrote that Morgan Carey was “a very scrawny child who was born with cerebral palsy, grand mal and petit mal epilepsy, and a left leg which was several inches shorter than the right.” The suit goes on to say he “overcame his disabilities and became as a young man very physically fit” who was featured in men’s fitness magazines. The lawsuit says Morgan Carey and his wife moved to Italy in 2012.
“While there, they wrote two screenplays, one of which was optioned for a film,” the lawsuit reads. “He is currently writing a permaculture-based fitness and lifestyle book.” New York Supreme Court records show that the defamation suit filed by Mariah Carey’s brother remains active in the court.
Sam Kubota is a senior digital editor and journalist for TODAY Digital based in Los Angeles. She joined NBC News in 2019. Becca Wood is a news and trending reporter for TODAY Digital based in New York City.
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