Bobby Brown says a priest 'tried to molest me' as a child: 'It was part of the reason' for drug and alcohol abuse

• Bobby Brown said a priest once tried to molest him.
• Brown said the incident happened when he was placed in temporary social care as a child.

Bobby Brown said that he believes part of his struggles with drug and alcohol abuse result from a childhood trauma when a priest attempted to molest him.

Brown — who is promoting his upcoming two-part A&E docuseries "Biography: Bobby Brown" — told People magazine that the incident happened when he was placed in temporary custody by social services after his mother was beaten and arrested by police while trying to intervene in the arrest of their neighbors.

The 53-year-old performer said the temporary accommodation was supposed to be a religious home, but it "wasn't a very nice place to be for a child."

"One of the priests tried to molest me," Brown explained. "He tried to touch my private parts. At that time, I was a young boy. I didn't know what sexual boundaries were. I just knew I didn't like being touched."

According to People, Brown recalled fighting back against the priest and fleeing the religious facility.

"Some things are hard to forget," he said. "That really, really bothered me as a child, and as a grown adult, I think it was part of the reason I did things, other things, drugs, alcohol, why I abused myself."

Brown — who has now been sober for 20 years — said that he never thought he would revisit the incident as he had buried it deep in his memory. However, Brown said that sharing his story has now "helped me get through a lot of other things that had been bothering me."

Elsewhere during the interview with People, as Insider previously reported, Brown said that he has recurring dreams about his two children who died.

Bobbi Kristina, the daughter Brown shared with his ex-wife, Whitney Houston, died in 2015 at age 22. Bobby Brown Jr., the son he shared with his former partner, Kim Ward, died in 2020 at age 27.

"I always see them at beaches or in fields," he said. In the dreams, his children are "running away, but they're laughing."

Brown finds the visions of them comforting, he added. "That's enough for a father to feel like God has them," said Brown.

"They're always together. I didn't have many dreams about Bobbi Kris before Bobby Jr. died. But then all of a sudden — floods of dreams."

Part one of "Biography: Bobby Brown" premieres on A&E Monday, May 30 at 8 p.m. ET and part two premieres Tuesday, May 31 at 8 p.m. ET.