♪ this is "nightline." >> tonight, devastating earthquake. destroying lives, families, homes. >> do they have a place to stay? do they have shelter now? >> parents burying children. our team on the ground in haiti with harrowing stories from survivors. >> she's showing me where she pulled her husband from and where they pulled the other children from as well. >> urgent rescue missions bringing a glimmer of hope. plus r. kelly on trial. the megawatt "i believe i can fly" star -- ♪ i believe i can touch the sky ♪ >> stunning fall after allegations of sexual abuse going back decades.

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♪ good evening. thank you for joining us. the extent of the devastation in haiti is slowly becoming clear. the reality is painful. the number of dead topping

2,000. the earthquake leveling homes, leaving so many families with nowhere to go. abc's matt gutman is on the ground in haiti. >> reporter: this kind of heartbreak needs no translation. a mother's pain after burying one of her children. we met lucia seville and her family in a graveyard in the town of marceline just as those grave diggers were finishing their work, burying her daughter rosna. she had also lost a grandchild in last weekend's earthquake, and her son and another daughter badly injured. one of her surviving daughters, adeline, inconsolable.

>> are they okay? do they have a place to stay? do they have shelter now? they don't have a house, the house is destroyed, it's nearby, flat. >> reporter: these past two nights, they say they've been sleeping in the streets. >> i was inside the house when it happened. the house was just spinning around and making a sound, whoo, whoo, whoo, and i just -- >> the house was spinning? >> felt like it was spinning. everything was underneath the rubble. >> reporter: the family walking me down their shattered neighborhood to the wreckage of their house. along the way their mother-in-law's home, at least one body still suck inside. lucia is her family's rock, holding adeline tight the entire walk.

>> this is the house. where did she pull him from? >> reporter: their house pancaked, and it's almost impossible to tell it ever was a home. and it was lucia who saved her family. >> she's showing me where she pulled her husband from, where they pulled the other children from as well. >> the husband from here. and the empty space in the top is where she got her daughter. she crawled in on her belly and got her. >> reporter: the mother guided by the screams of her loved ones, pulling out six survivors. >> everybody says they're sleeping in the streets, still afraid of aftershocks. many of them just don't have a place to go. >> reporter: haitian authorities say they've counted about 2,000 dead from saturday's 7.2-magnitude quake, a number they expect to rise. there are so many dead that caskets are being driven out on mopeds. >> the fear that we have

additional earthquakes in the upcoming days, so many people and families are sleeping outside. there's a lot of the sadness here, and people are deeply affected. >> reporter: making matters worse, tropical storm grace plowing through haiti, slamming the quake zone with high winds and over a foot of rain. the storm leaving behind battered roads choked with mud and debris. with the rain coming down on monday, we first met sarah and her family cooking dinner under a leaky tarp. >> this tarp is basically held up by a stick. and that's all they have right now. whoa! >> reporter: in the morning we went back to find them. >> this is what's left of the tarp. >> reporter: they were soaked and exhausted. >> a neighbor allowed them to sleep in this bus, but they said it was shaking all night long. and none of them slept. >> reporter: the few search and rescue teams we have seen

battling tough conditions. but over the weekend they managed to pull this mother and child from a collapsed building. they are the lucky ones. very few others have been found alive. this region hit hardest by the quake, largely cut off. some of the surrounding areas controlled not by the government but by gangs. mudslides transforming the landscape and burying major roads. the fight for resources, a matter of life and death. >> they're distributing food behind me. you can see how intense it's getting. it gives you a sense of how hungry people are and how desperate they are here. >> it's a lot of fear, uncertainty. and sometimes a loss of hope, also. that is affecting the population. >> reporter: desperation is everywhere in these villages. help has not been. and the only reliable way in, by

way. the u.s. coast guard is here running medevac missions to get the severely injured to higher care. with the help of medic volunteers like brian johnson. one after another after another, more than 100 medevac'd in the last three days. hospitals here are overrun and often too damaged to actually house patients. many patients stuck waiting, some in tents outside. at this hospital in la caille, the broken bodies continue arriving. >> this is one of the patients who continues to trickle into hospitals like this. survivors of the earthquake. he has a double pelvic fracture, suffering for days without medical care. >> reporter: eve is 9 years old, suffering for four days without proper medical care. >> stable but he's going to require intervention in order to heal the pelvis. >> you're getting patients coming in days after the

earthquake? >> yeah, we are. >> reporter: there isn't enough staff, equipment, or medicine, and the injuries are devastating. outside, as we were interviewing the hospital's only orthopedic doctor, a father bringing in his son. his face swollen, his headba bandaged. >> did this boy get hurt in the earthquake? >> earthquake. >> reporter: with a glance the doctor knew he couldn't treat him here. >> somebody comes in like this, what can you do for him? >> first thing, if it's head trauma, they call the helicopter and transfer them to port a prince. >> you can't treat head trauma here? >> i don't have staff, no. >> reporter: the quake comes as haiti is reeling from a punishing three months. the island struggling to deal with the covid-19 pandemic, rising gang violence, and political turmoil following the assassination of president jove nel moyes. >> today you have a country that is facing multiple crises.

there's a political crisis, of course, which has always been there. then there's a humanitarian crisis. 4 million haitians who are basically facing increased hunger. on top of it, there was a malnutrition crisis. we are now undergoing a huge surge in terms of covid. on top of that, there's an economic crisis. >> reporter: saturday's quake triggering the trauma of the 2010 earthquake that brought haiti to its knees. an event so devastating, the country still has not fully recovered. more than 200,000 killed. the island sits near the intersection of two huge tectonic plates which creates multiple fault lines that cut right through the island. this weekend's quake likely in the same fault zone that triggered that 2010 earthquake. >> this country has suffered through a lot of different problems that continue to exist. but one of the things that i always tell people, as broken as the country is, it has a lot of promise. >> reporter: here where there is

so much need, a little help goes a long way. >> we're going to check in on lucia. >> reporter: we found our way back to lucia and her family. they've ridden out the storm on a neighbor's porch. i asked lucia if she thinks she could ever recover. she responds by saying, i will never stop crying. this country, these people, ravaged by so much disaster, they're left relying on others' generosity to pick up the pieces and start all over again. >> our thanks to matt. up next, disgraced superstar r. kelly finally facing his accusers. tackling tough messes can take more time than you have, but mr. clean clean freak delivers the power of a deep clean in minutes unlike bleach sprays, ...clean freak starts deep cleaning on contact with three times the cleaning power to break down tough messes in seconds it quickly cleans your home's toughest messes so, for a deep clean in minutes, get mr. clean clean freak

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♪ the rumors go back decades. r. kelly, the megastar, accused of sexual abusing numerous underage girls. kelly is now facing trial and charges that could land him in jail for life if convicted. abc's janai norman is following the proceedings. >> opening statements are set today in brooklyn for the federal sexual abuse trial of r&b singer r. kelly. >> we've been struggling so long, over five years. >> reporter: the painful search for justice for alleged sex abuse victims of r&b star r. kelly within reach in a federal courtroom in brooklyn, new york. >> it's important to be here the first day to hear the opening statements, to provide some relief for us, some kind of closure. >> reporter: for more than two decades the "i believe i can fly" singer has been plagued by

allegations of abuse and sex with underage girls. he has consistently denied all accusations. >> he is no longer the king of r&b who may have some kinky proclivi proclivities. he is a sexual predator who can also sing. >> reporter: but the 54-year-old singer now on trial for racketeering and sex trafficking of six females, three of them in their teens. kelly pleaded not guilty, but if convicted he faces ten years to life in prison. the lone racketeering charge allowing prosecutors to introduce acts from any relevant time, including his brief marriage to the late sing are aaliyah in 1994. she was just 15 years old at the time. he was 27. the 18-page imdocument unsealed in 2019 laying out disturbing details, alleging kelly used his fame to recruit women and girls to engage in illegal sexual activity. prosecutors also accusing kelly of controlling his alleged

victims, saying the women and girls were not permitted to leave their room without receiving permission from kelly, including to eat or go to the bathroom. they were also required to call kelly "daddy." >> the way the prosecution is laying that out is that runners, producers, managers, people around r. kelly knew of his sexual desires, and that they helped facilitate that by gramming these women, by finding them in a crowd, by bringing them to him. >> reporter: kelly also facing sex-related charges in minnesota and illinois. he's pleaded not guilty in both cases. kelly has been in prison awaiting trial in new york for two years. >> while we're sitting inside of the courtroom, absolutely stoic as this testimony is coming in, both when the prosecution is giving their opening statements, but also the defense. and i'm seeing him lean over a little to the defense counsel and whisper as evidence is coming in. >> reporter: his attorneys portraying some of his alleged victims as groupies, calling the relationships consensual.

der deronda pace, the first alleged victim, shocking testimony saying she had sex with kelly when she was 15. she shared her story with syndicated talk show "the real." >> he tells you he's going to give you a spanking. where does that lead to? is there fear? is there -- >> yes, it's very frightening. he would slap you in your face. and he would physically harm you. and he would put you in a room, and he would lock you in the room for days. >> reporter: this is not kelly's first time in court. >> grammy-winning singer r. kelly acquitted on all charges of a pornography charge -- >> reporter: acquitted after the girl in that case refused to testify against him. but kelly's true fall from grace began in 2017 after a report by "buzzfeed" included allegations of a sex cult run by the artist

and his associates. the article stating kelly had six females, some of them teenage girls, under his control, stating, he controls every aspect of their lives, dictating what they eat, how they dress, when they bathe, when they sleep, and how they engage in sexual encounters that he records. today's trial may have never happened without the explosive 2019 lifetime docuseries "surviving r. kelly" in which dozens of accusers spoke out about being abused by the singer. >> it was consensual, but it was consented by intimidation. i look back, and there's an ipad. and i just turn my head away. i didn't want my face to be on it. >> it it just kept going and going and going. >> i just want you to know you're not alone. they're not alone. >> reporter: sharing stories of controlling behavior. >> you had to pretty much agree to it, no matter how demeaning

it felt. >> these were black girls, and no one cared. so i think it was really that perfect storm of someone who was so protected and so many people idolized, and actually made careers from, and the fact that these were black girls from chicago, and nobody cared. >> black girls matter! black girls matter! >> reporter: a public outcry followed with protests raging outside kelly's chicago studio. law enforcement and the prosecutor's office again took notice. >> i'm here today to encourage victims of sexual assault or domestic violence related to these allegations to please get i touch with our office. >> reporter: months later, kelly defending himself in an explosive interview with cbs' gayle king. >> have you ever had sex -- >> no. >> -- with anyone under the age of 17? >> no. >> never? >> no. >> i have to tell you, it's so hard to believe that based on all the -- >> i'm going to tell you

something -- >> what women said about you -- >> what women said about me -- so nobody's allowed to be mad at me and be scorned and -- how stupid would it be for me to -- with my crazy past and what i've been through, oh, right now i just think i need to be a monster and hold girls against their will, chain them up in my basement -- >> robert -- >> i didn't do this stuff. this is not me. i'm fighting for my [ bleep ] life. >> reporter: now after decades of allegations, his defense team must convince a federal jury that he's innocent. >> in terms of r. kelly's legal battles, this is just the first day of many long days in an uphill battle. he's got this case in brooklyn, another federal case in illinois, and so let's say hypothetically he gets acquitted. he still has to go to illinois and face very similar charges. if he's convicted in new york, i would say think more harvey weinstein, how he got convicted in new york, had to go to

california. he, being r. kelly, would face a similar situation where he's indicted here in the federal system in new york, he'll more likely than not be transferred to illinois to also stand trial for those charges. >> reporter: with the trial expected to last about four weeks, alleged survivors are hopeful that they will finally be heard. >> i believe from the survivors that i've spoken with, they all want the same thing, and they want justice. they want validation. they want the world to know what this man did to them, and they want to be believed and supported and validated. >> our thanks to janai. up next, a preview of abc's exclusive interview with president biden. like many people with moderate to severe ulcerative colitis or crohn's disease, i was there. be right back. but my symptoms were keeping me from where i needed to be. so i talked to my doctor and learned

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♪ finally tonight, president biden has come under heavy criticism in recent days, defending his administration's actions in afghanistan. he gave his first television interview since the taliban takeover to abc's george stephanopoulos. >> so you don't think this could have been handled, actually could have been handled better in any way? no mistakes? >> no, i -- i don't think it

could have been handled in a way that -- there -- we're going to go back in hindsight and look, but the idea that somehow there's a way to have gotten out without chaos ensuing, i don't know how that happens. i don't know how that happened. >> for you that was always priced into the decision? >> yes. >> there will be much more of george's interview tomorrow on "good morning america" and here on "nightline." that's "nightline" for this evening. catch our full episodes on hulu. we'll see you right back here same time tomorrow. thanks for the company, america. good night. i'm morgan, and there's more to me than hiv. more love, more adventure, more community. but with my hiv treatment, there's not more medicines in my pill. i talked to my doctor and switched to fewer medicines with dovato. dovato is for some adults who are starting hiv-1 treatment or replacing their current hiv-1 regimen. with just 2 medicines in 1 pill, dovato is as effective as a 3-drug regimen... to help you reach and stay undetectable.