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On the 10th anniversary of Prince's death, an ex-girlfriend is speaking out again. But the bigger story may be what Netflix agreed never to air — and who benefits from keeping it buried.

INSIDE THIS REPORT

1. Netflix greenlit a Prince documentary directed by Oscar-winner Ezra Edelman — featuring domestic violence claims — and then quietly shelved it after reaching a deal with Prince's estate, which argued the project would cause "generational harm" to his image.
2. Ex-girlfriend and vocalist Jill Jones — who sang on Prince's landmark album1999 — claims he punched her repeatedly in the face following a 1984 hotel confrontation, and that members of Prince's inner circle pressured her to stay silent to protect a financially lucrative career.
3. No police report was ever filed, no hospital records exist, and no contemporaneous documentation of any kind has been produced to corroborate the allegations — raising critical questions about legal standards of proof, the rights of deceased persons, and the timing of claims surfacing precisely on a milestone anniversary.

[Samuel López - Investigative Reporter · USA Herald] - Ten years. A decade since the world lost one of the most singular creative forces it has ever produced. And yet here we are — not celebrating the genius of a man who gave us Purple Rain, Sign 'O' the Times, and a catalog so vast it still hasn't been fully released to the public — but instead, once again, watching the machinery of posthumous reputation management grind into motion.

This week, on the 10th anniversary of Prince's death on April 21, 2016, USA Herald can exclusively examine the full scope of what Netflix had planned, what Prince's estate fought to kill, and why the claims being recycled in the tabloid press right now deserve far more scrutiny than they are receiving.

THE SHELVED DOCUMENTARY

Netflix commissioned a documentary on Prince directed by Ezra Edelman — the Oscar-winning filmmaker behind the landmark O.J. Simpson series O.J.: Made in America. By every measure, Edelman is not a filmmaker who traffics in gossip. He is a serious documentarian. Which makes what happened next all the more significant.

The planned series was dramatically shelved. Prince's estate intervened, arguing the project would cause what it described as "generational harm" to the musician's image. A deal was reportedly struck. The cameras stopped. The footage, the interviews, the allegations — all of it, locked away. Netflix, a platform with the resources and the institutional backbone to fight back, chose instead to make a deal.