Oprah Winfrey addressed her brother's cause of death 35 years after his passing. In honor of Pride Month, the professional talk show star opened up about Jeffrey Lee, admitting he "died from AIDS." While Oprah is getting showered with praise over the decision to speak out, RadarOnline.com has uncovered Lee's sad, dark, and lonely last days, in which he claimed his famous half-sister had turned her back on him.
Lee was the son of Oprah's mother by a different father, and he came clean about his diagnosis before his death in December 1998 at 29.
"I have AIDS and Oprah knows it, but she's not sympathetic," he declared in a bombshell interview at the time. "She's made it clear that, AIDS or not, I'm on my own."
Lee claimed Oprah's attitude was "'It's your own fault. It serves you right.' Oprah believes that every gay is going to get AIDS eventually." He claimed the last time he spoke to Oprah was months before, and she never came to see him in the hospital when he believed death was knocking at his door.
"At the end of last year, I was in the hospital and felt really dreadful. I thought I was going to die. Oprah never came to see me. And I don't get any money at all from her," Lee stated in his explosive sitdown with National Enquirer.
But sources close to Oprah — who made $37 million in just two years back then — defended the TV star, saying that even though she hated Jeffrey's lifestyle, she helped him financially in the past and paid his rent for months. And while she had allegedly stopped giving him money at the time, she increased the payments she made to her motherVernita Lee — and let her know they could be used to help Jeffrey.
"I don't think homosexuality as much offends Oprah," Jeffrey said. "What really upset her was my lifestyle — partying, running around, not holding down a job.
"Oprah told me, 'You need to get God in your life. You really need Jesus.'"
Jeffrey — who found out he had AIDS about eight months before the interview — claimed Oprah was "unsympathetic" when he discussed the diagnosis with her.
"She just said, 'Oh, God, I'm sorry.' She told me that she hoped I'd be able to deal with it, to accept the fact that there's no cure yet, to accept the inevitable. She was sorry... but not very sympathetic," he told the National Enquirer. "It wasn't a surprise to Oprah because of my gay lifestyle. Although she did not use these words, it was a kind of 'Serves you right, you brought it yourself' attitude."
Oprah was never close to her half brother because as a child she was shuttled between her mother and father, and when she left her mother's home at 13, Jeffrey was only a child of 6 or 7, sources claimed.
"She used to always help me out financially," Lee claimed. "If I needed $500 or even $2,000 she'd just give it to me. But we had a big row. This was before the AIDS thing. She didn't like the way I was living."
Oprah's representative at the time pushed back at Lee's allegations.
"Oprah tripled the monthly allowance she was giving her mother, and told her that if she wanted to pay Jeffrey's rent then it would be up to her mother. It was understood that her mother could use the money for herself or to support Jeffrey."
Despite his public outcry, Lee said, "I really don't have any animosity to Oprah. Let's face it, I basically screwed myself up by being irresponsible.
"I know Oprah has millions and could make things a lot easier for me... take some of the anxiety out of my life," her half brother continued. "But I'm not bitter. I love her very much and I always will."
As this outlet reported, Oprah took to social media to pay tribute to her brother, opening up about his AIDS journey 35 years after his death.
"He was 29-years-old. The year was 1989 and the world was an extremely cruel place, not just for people suffering from AIDS, but also for LGBTQ people in general," she said in part.
"I often think if he'd lived, he'd be so amazed at how much the world has changed, that there actually is gay marriage and a Pride Month. How different his life might have been had he lived in these times, in a world that saw and appreciated him for who he was rather than attempting to shame him for his sexuality."