Rihanna’s Dad Ronald Fenty Dies at 70 Following a Brief Illness
The singer’s dad died in Los Angeles
Rihanna’s father, Ronald Fenty, has passed away, as confirmed by PEOPLE. He was 70 years old.
Starcom Network, the first to share the news, reported that Fenty died in Los Angeles after experiencing “a brief illness.” The exact cause and date of his death have not been disclosed yet.
Sources informed the outlet, which is from Rihanna’s home country of Barbados, that Fenty’s family was with him during his final moments.
In pictures obtained by TMZ, Rihanna’s brother, Rajad Fenty, was seen arriving at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center on May 28. The report also mentioned that the singer was in the car as well.
Rihanna’s representatives did not reply right away to PEOPLE’s request for a comment on Saturday, May 31.
Rihanna, who is currently pregnant and waiting for her third baby, was born to Fenty and her mom, Monica Braithwaite, in February 1988. (The star is already a mom to her sons, Rza, who is 3, and Riot, who is 1, with A$AP Rocky.)
Along with Rihanna and Rajad, Fenty and Braithwaite also had a son named Rorrey. Rihanna has three half-siblings from her dad’s earlier relationships: sisters Samantha and Kandy, and a brother named Jamie.
Fenty and Braithwaite brought up their family in Bridgetown, Barbados, where Rihanna lived until she turned 16. They lived in a bungalow on a street that is now called Rihanna Drive.
The couple split up when the “Love on the Brain” singer was young, and they officially got divorced in 2002, when Rihanna was just 14.
Rihanna’s relationship with her father has had its ups and downs over the years.
After the star was attacked by her then-boyfriend Chris Brown in 2009, Fenty supposedly talked to the media about what happened without her daughter’s permission. Rihanna later discussed the issue in an interview with Vogue, where she described the situation as “really strange.”
“You grow up with your father, you know him, you are a part of him, for goodness’ sakes!” she said, according to Billboard. “And then he does something so weird that I can’t even start to understand it.”
A year later, Rihanna told Oprah that she “fixed” her relationship with Fenty, but they still had disagreements, including in 2019, when Rihanna took legal action against her father for supposedly using her name to make money.
She said, among other things, that her father started a talent development company in 2017 called Fenty Entertainment, pretending to be her manager to get new clients. However, three weeks before the trial was set to begin in 2021, Rihanna asked to drop the lawsuit, as reported by the BBC.